Stee1 & Sw0rds
by Crysina
Summary: Witness the rise of Stee1 & Sw0rds, a guild out there to help people in the mad virtual world. Tag along with a group of survivors that try to do their best to stay together and pull through this nightmare. A dream game turned into a gnarly prison. An OC centered story with canon character appearances. (Status: Completed)
1. Chapter 1 - Welcome to Sword Art Online

Author's Note:

I want it to be known this is a republishing and continuation of a story I once started uploading to this site of the same name. If you are new to this story, stick around for a while, you might just enjoy yourself. (I do not own any assets of the SAO Project nor does my story represent the opinions or story planned/written by Reki Kawahara. I merely own my characters and the story that develops on the following work since it comes from my own creative mind.)

So please, kick back and enjoy Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds!

* * *

**Chapter 1 - Welcome to Sword Art Online**

**November/6th/2022**

**Alshep**

Finally, it is finally here. Sword Art Online. The pinnacle of VR gaming. I stood in line for a good seven hours just to wait for the damn thing to launch, but I finally have my copy. Eagerly I stand at register ready to pay for it.

"That'll be six thousand five hundred yen please," says the cashier.

More than willing I hand over the money. This game is going to be the best thing in years to come. Complete immersion. The acclaimed -full dive- is finally possible. All thanks to a nifty piece of tech called NerveGear. This helmet kind of thing actually taps into your brain and feeds it the whole game. It's supposed to work by interacting with your brainwaves. This way the piece of hardware is able to stimulate your senses. All five of them.

The amazing technology works hard to make you feel as if you were in the game. You move like in the real world, see, touch and feel. It's…it's just like real life. Except for not feeling pain, which is good of course. Thanks to a friend of mine I was able to play Sword Art Online's beta for a day. He got too excited and into the game that he only let me play the damn thing one time. It was amazing. I forgot everything about the real world and found myself absorbed into a new one. I was in a whole new world, vast and colorful, filled with exciting possibilities of adventure.

A short bus ride home is what now separates me from losing what little I have of a social life. Feeling beyond excited I board the bus as patiently as I I'm able to. I can't wait until I'm in my neighborhood. A few minutes go by and the doors open, as soon as that happens I'm off running. Turn right here, left there, go a few flights of stairs up, and soon enough I'm standing at my door step.

"I'm home!" I yell as I enter my home and take my shoes off.

Not even caring if someone replied to what I yell I speed towards my room and slam the door behind me as I enter it. Fumbling with the bag the game is in I reach inside and grab the game's case. Not wasting any more time I pop the game in and grab my NerveGear. I'm so glad I purchased the helmet before my copy of the game. Putting the thing on feels somewhat tight and weird, but once I start the link none of that will matter. Seriously, technology never ceases to amaze me. Thankfully, while in the excitement of the night before I had already charged and calibrated my gear. I am just minutes away from starting to play. It really paid off to at least convince the ever so gallant Charles' to let me install SAO's client into my computer. I strap myself in and lay down on my bed. It is two twenty six, a lot of the lucky ten thousand people with copies should already be playing by now. I get comfortable and close my eyes.

"Link start."

I start seeing streaks of light fly in my direction, but I know I am no longer in my body; the NerveGear has started its amazing doings. After a few seconds of flashing colors of what seems to be a long tunnel I find myself at the calibration screen. It quickly okays my settings and prompts me with a log in screen. I'm a bit surprised since I have never really played something with a log in screen, SAO is going to be the first MMORPG I ever play and I'm excited it is going to be a VR one, the whole concept of the full dive and the game itself is already interesting and it is just begging me to try it by myself. I did get to play that one time, but it was short lived and sadly so long ago. Once I go through the log-in screen I find a character slot.

I get an option to create a new character, I quickly select it and it displays what might as well be a mirror. Slightly curly short black hair, tall, slightly chubby. I'm certainly not going to play as myself. Why be yourself when you can be a better version of yourself? Just to fool around a bit I go over the "change sex" option. A few seconds later I quickly change back to normal. Horrible idea. A woman with my physical qualities isn't exactly what I would call attractive.

Without hesitation I start making some minor adjustments over my image. Straight hair. A Little muscle here. Less fat here. Some other minor changes and done. My avatar is ready. The starting clothes are nothing too shabby, but they look good nevertheless. With a brown and black combination it looks nice. I choose a long sword as a starting weapon and place the sheath at my hip. I've always liked knights hence why I place the sheath there. There is nothing more badass than a knight casually resting his arm on the pommel of his sheathed sword.

-Is this Character OK?-

I press the "yes" option and wait for about three seconds.

-Are you sure?-

Yes, I am sure game. Are you questioning how good I look or something? After selecting the right option a flash of white light blinds me for a moment. My ears start ringing for some reason. Things slowly become clear before my eyes. I feel ground below my feet; I wobble around a bit and touch my legs.

"Holy crap this is amazing!" I exclaim.

I can feel the fabric of my pants. Lifting my head a little I can see a plaza with people coming out of blue flashes of light. Voices sound clear and I can even hear the steps of people around me.

"Hey guys, let's go hunt some of the boar looking things!" says a player going past me with her group.

The warmth of the sun, the slow yet fresh air current, I can feel it all. Reaching for my sheath I feel my sword and slowly take it out of the scabbard. The blade gracefully reflects sunlight as I thrust it into the air in excitement.

"Woah! Watch it, man!" huffs player walking by.

All feelings of excitement disappear as I pull my sword down in embarrassment.

"Err, sorry," I say while scratching my head.

I sheath the weapon and turn around still being mesmerized by all the things going on around me.

"Haha, want to get an orange cursor over your head already or what?"

I recognize that voice.

"Charles!" I shout while turning around to a bald man and his companion, "You…you are bald…"

Charles is my friend form school and the one who let me try out SAO's beta. His name is not Charles obviously, that's just what he calls himself in every single game with an online component. Calling him by his online moniker has become commonplace for me even in the real world, a bit of an inside joke.

"Indeed I am, and guess what? Charles is my user name once again," he says while laughing.

It looks like I'm spot on, again.

"Huh? Now that you mention it…I can't see it," I mumble.

"Oh, I guess I should invite you to our party first," he mutters.

He starts going through a floating menu, it's slightly transparent but it has all kinds of options all over it. I find myself ogling like an excited child when his friend has a new toy. The menu seems to be significantly different here than it was on the beta.

"Wait, first things first. How did you know it was me?" I question.

"Well, you always make the same kind of character for games. I would even dare to say you have the same user name as always."

Well that is bullshit, he is either psychic or…I do make the same kind of character for games. A beep snaps me out of my thoughts as a little screen pops up in-front of me. It's a friend invite from Charles, I hover my finger over the blue circle and press it. It feels natural and the little screen is dismissed as I do so. A second later another little screens pops up, it's a party invite from Charles. I press the circle again; I glance to my health bar on the upper left corner of my own vision and I'm able to see two other bars being added just below it.

"Oh, I forgot, I got this other guy with me, his name is Daath. We met during the beta testing period," Charles says.

The thin black haired guy behind him steps forward and extends his hand to greet me. Grabbing his hand with a tight grip I shake hands with him.

"Pleasure to meet you, Alshep. A friend of Charles is a friend of mine," he says.

"Haha! I knew it! Same character name as always!" shouts the bald man.

I grin as I punch him on the arm.

"Shut up, you chose a bald man!" I tease.

Daath starts laughing and I join in to mock my friend. We stop laughing when something crashes with us, toppling us to the ground. It didn't hurt at all, but it sure was disorienting and I could feel the impact as pressure.

"What the hell, watch it!" I yell.

"I-I'm so sorry."

A girl is on her knees rubbing her head about a foot or so away from me. She has red hair and is wearing a purple cloak. She looks about my age, a tad bit shorter than me. I get up on my feet and stare down at her, a little angry to be honest. She seems to be shaking, probably thanks to her legs being all wobbly.

"Are you alright?" Daath asks while helping the girl up on her feet.

"Uh…uhm yes, thank you, sir," she replies.

This girl looks clumsy as hell. I think on it for a second and scare myself a little. She might be a man or an old lady, or worse an old man. An awful goose bump goes up my spine as I imagine it.

"You seem fairly new to this, why don't you join us? We are going to teach this guy how to play. You might as well come along," says Charles as he pats my back.

The girl seems flustered as she looks at her feet and fidgets a little. Charles keeps patting on my back as if waiting for me to answer to stop doing so. The girl keeps doing her little shy dance on spot for a few seconds.

"Yes or no?" I ask with a harsh tone.

This breaks her out of her fidgeting and she looks straight at us.

"Y-y-yes! Yes please, please teach me how to play!" she says.

Charles stops his patting and then slaps my back, hard. Trying not to trip I step forwards a bit. I sigh in my head as I hope for the girl not to be a creepy old man. The little screen pops up in-front of the girl and she nervously presses the blue circle. Another green bar is added below Daath's and I am able to see a name.

-Elina-

"Alright! We are set! Let's teach these two newbies how to play Daath!" Charles shouts.

He always makes too much of a fuzz out of things. Elina gets besides me and smiles at me before turning to see the other guys.

"Please don't be a creepy old man," I mutter under my breath.

"Did you say something?" she asks softly.

"Huh? Nope, not at all," I reply

"First off! What weapons did you two choose!?" Charles screams.

"I got a long sword," I say while unsheathing the cool looking piece of metal.

"I chose a short sword," says Elina while taking her weapon out as well.

Daath nods and Charles scratches his chin, trying to appear thoughtful. A few seconds pass by and he doesn't move nor mutters anything. Even Daath gets in front of him to see what is going on. Charles lets his arms down with a quick movement

"OK! So a sharp stick and a butter knife! Let's move!"

What? Elina suddenly looks embarrassed and she sheathes her sword. I do the same as I try not to punch my friend in the face. Charles walks past us and Daath waits for us to follow Charles. Daath seems to be on the verge of laughter.

"He can be a little…"

"Weird, haha I know," I interrupt Daath.

"Is my sword really a butter knife?" Elina mutters.

Daath laughs a little and pats her back.

"Don't worry; he has a starter sword as well. Even I have a starter long sword," he says trying to reassure the girl.

We keep walking down a large street; a kind of lake can be seen in the distance. The town door is placed farther across the lake. I take a few seconds to just look around as we walk. It all feels so lively, so real, so interesting.

"Oh right, take these as a gift from myself, " says Daath while handing us each, one red vial.

"Health potions?" I ask.

"Yes, but be weary, these take a bit to kick in so be sure to drink if you feel in danger."

Both Elina and I take the vials and store them in our inventory. We keep walking some more and we are already past the lake and heading out of town before I have time to notice. Charles walks in front of us in a really absurd way as we follow.

"Wait, isn't everyone supposed to be new to this game? How can you two know how to play? It just came out today," says Elina.

"True, but some people were given early access to the game as beta testers," replies Daath

We make it out of town and into a big open field of grasslands. Other players go in and out of town, rushing, laughing, and having a blast. A strong breeze passes by, brushing the field's grass. I see boars and some big insects not too far away from the entrance itself.

"What is a beta tester?" Elina asks.

Wow, you have got to be kidding me?

"By any chance, is this your first MMORPG?" I ask while trying not to be rude, but being a hypocrite.

Elina nods as we keep walking. Daath glances at me with a confused look.

"My sister got it for me, she said it might pique my interest and maybe it'll make me happy," she states.

"Well, a beta tester is a person from a selected group of people chosen to try the game before it comes out," I explain.

I wonder what kind of person is she, if she is a girl that is. Or a guy…a regular guy please.

"I see. That's very nice of your sister. Well, we are here now so we better teach you how to use your weapons," Daath adds.

I unsheathe my sword and place myself in front of a boar. For a low level enemy its eyes are rather intimidating to be honest. Charles looks at me and nods. What are you my master or something? I return my attention to my enemy and get on a battle stance. A whirring sound confirms that I'm charging a sword skill. Great, just like in the beta. I let my body move forwards and jump over the boar. Confused it tries to find me but I quickly slice through him. I sheath my sword and stand proudly for approval as the result screen pops up in-front of me.

-Result-

-Exp: 20-

-Col: 15-

-Items: 0-

"That was amazing!" Elina cheers.

"It seems you remember from what little I let you play, huh?" Charles chuckles.

"Yeah, I'm like ten percent beta tester," I reply jokingly to Charles.

Daath and Charles laugh as Elina stands there confused by what I just said. The swiftness and speed this game grants you is amazing, there is no way I could've done that in real life.

"Are you a beta tester too, Alshep?" she asks.

I shake my head and get ready to reply, but I'm quickly interrupted by Charles.

"It so turns out I know this little bugger in real life. We attend to the same school, I let him play a little of my beta version," he says while putting his arm over me and pulling me close to him.

"Yeah, haha," I say while pushing Charles off me.

She wows in awe and turns to Daath.

"What about you Daath? Do you know them in real life too?"

He smiles and shakes his head.

"No, I only know Charles from the beta period," he replies.

Daath and Elina smile to each other as another boar spawns close to us.

"Just a heads up, I asked my sister to disconnect me in an hour or so since we have to go out to buy some stuff. So I'll be leaving you guys then," Charles reports.

I look at the clock, three forty. Time sure flies in here

"It's your turn Elina, show us what you can do," says Daath as he bumps the girl into the general path of the boar.

The poor girl almost falls with the push and readies her sword while shaking a little. She side steps a bit and charges at the boar. With a sword skill she could easily take him out in one hit or two. I guess she isn't that familiar with the system yet. Elina flails at the boar damaging it only a little.

"Watch out, it counters after a little while!" Charles shouts.

Elina dumbfounded turns to us leaving her defense open.

Oh boy.

The boar hits her, knocking her to the ground and depleting quite a bit of her health.

"Quickly, get up and try a sword skill. Think as if you were about to attack it really hard," says Daath.

Elina gets on her feet and steps back a little before looking at us again. She refocuses and lifts her sword over her head. It lights up as she closes her eyes.

"What in the world is she doing?" I mutter.

"Focusing," Daath says.

The boar takes this as teasing and charges at Elina. This is a lost cause; it's going to hit her again. To my surprise she side steps swiftly before getting hit and slices the boar vertically as it passes next to her.

The boar turns into light and the results appear before Elina. She jumps in joy and shouts out in excitement.

"I did it!"

We clap in sync at her success as she hops over to us. She smiles and seems to be rather excited of her accomplishment.

"How do I equip an item?" She asks.

Daath quickly walks her through the inventory screens and tells her how to equip items. Meanwhile I talk with Charles about how much the game amazes me. Soon enough Elina has a new round shield equipped and we continue through the grasslands hunting some boars.

Daath proves to be an experienced player as he kicks a boar off the ground and slices it midair. It's amazing how little limitations this game has as of what you can do. It's simply overwhelming. More time passes by and I'm the only one without any new piece of gear. Elina got another sword and Daath too. Charles is flashing a new coat he got from a wolf.

"So how far did you make it during the beta, Daath?" I ask.

Charles is teaching Elina how to do a -switch- during battle as both Daath and I stand in the sidelines.

"I mean like how far up did you make it?" I ask

"Not very far, I only made it to the fifth floor. Although I did hear some players made it higher than that," he says.

We watch as Elina does a successful switch with Charles and kills a boar. That looked nice. As they walk over to us. Charles just bursts into tiny crystals of light. Elina jumps from the sudden visual effect and tumbles right on her butt.

"Woah…what the hell was that?" I ask.

"Hmm…he did say he was going to leave in a while, but that's nothing like the logging out transition of the beta. My guess is that they changed it for the full release of the game," says Daath.

"Guys! Guys! What happened to Charles?!" Elina asks worriedly.

"It's nothing Elina, he must've been logged out by his sister," I say.

"Oh, alright. What should we do now?"

Daath sits down and smiles. We are going to sit? I don't follow. Elina sits next to him and they both gaze past me as if I were invisible.

"What are you two doing?" I prod.

Daath extends his arm and points in front of him.

"Look," he says.

I turn to a bright beautiful sunset. Clouds subtly over arch the mountains making a beautiful sight along with the floating islands and waterfalls. This…is amazing. I sit and lose myself in the beautiful scenery set before me. I feel the soft grass with my hands and warm touch of the sun in my face.

"This is beautiful," says Elina.

"Yes, it truly is," replies Daath.

As if rehearsed, all three of us exhale loudly. Our moment of peace is abruptly interrupted by loud bells sounding off in the distance. The ringing is constant and very loud; the sound seems to be coming from the city we exited a few hours ago.

"What is it with that noise?" I ask.

Daath gets on his feet and helps Elina up.

"If I knew trust me I would tell you. This first day has been very odd, first the log out button is nowhere to be found and now this. None of this happened in the beta."

"Wait, what? There's no log out button?" says Elina.

"Yeah, I first noticed when I logged in," Daath mutters.

To confirm this as the bells continue, I quickly bring up my menu by swiping my hand in front of me. I go over the icons and go in shock as I confirm it.

"What is going o-" Elina says as she disappears from our sight in a flash of light.

Light suddenly engulfs me as well and I find myself standing in the plaza where I started playing. Elina is standing just a few feet away from me when Daath suddenly appears between me and her. Looking around I notice a massive group of players has been gathered in the plaza. What in the world is going on?

"They force teleported us here..." Daath mutters.

Is this some kind of event then? Why gather all of us here? All of the people around us seem anxious and scared. The atmosphere makes it feel like something bad is about to happen. The bells come to a sudden stop and the chatter from players does too. Elina gasps as she points to a red figure in the sky.

-System Announcement-

The figure slowly starts to replicate, it soon covers all the sky with impressive speed and things took a turn to the bizarre. The sky starts dripping a gooey red liquid. It looks like blood at first. Gross and unsettling, but it slowly starts to take an even more unsettling form.

It finally forms something recognizable. It looks like a man in red robes. It is gigantic, it has this omnipotent feeling to it. It slowly moves its arms up and speaks.

"Players, Welcome to my world. I am Kabaya Akihiko. I'm the only person currently in control of this world."

"That's the guy, he created SAO," says Daath.

I find myself baffled by what is going on, the man's presence is too much, too big, too powerful for me to just overlook.

"I hope you have already noticed the log out button is missing from the main menu. This, is not a game malfunction."

How is it not a game malfunction?! We are supposed to be able to log in and out freely. People all around me open their menus and seem shocked. I guess they didn't check it earlier either…

"I repeat. This is not a malfunction, but an original feature of Sword Art Online. You cannot log out of SAO on your own and no one in the real world will be able to remove or shut down your NerveGear."

"That's bullshit, Charles was able to log out just fine a bit ago," I say.

Daath and Elina both nod at me and turn to Akihiko quickly.

"Should this be attempted, the transmitter inside the NerveGear will emit a powerful burst microwaves destroying your brain and thus ending your life."

My legs go numb and I kneel slowly, I feel sick, really sick. There's no way, Charles is still alive, there's no way he is dead.

"That isn't true…is it?" Elina asks.

"I…I don't know," Daath replies.

"Unfortunately, the friends and families of several players ignored this and have attempted to remove the NerveGear. As a result, 213 players have permanently retired from both Aincrad and the real world.

In a fit of anger I punch the floor.

"No! There is no way, you are lying!" I yell, part of me hoping that maybe I will be heard in between the massive crowd.

"As you can see, news organizations around the world are reporting this incident, and its many deaths. Thus, you can assume the danger of having your NerveGear removed to be greatly reduced. So, please relax and work hard to clear the game."

As the massive figure speaks, it shows us pictures and video of what he's talking about.

"Let us out! You are lying!" someone shouts.

"However, do take note of this. You can no longer re-spawn in this game. If your HP reaches zero your avatar will be permanently deleted and at the same time…the NerveGear will fry your brain."

What..? Around me people are panicking, I hear crying and shouts of agony.

"You need only fulfill one condition to set yourselves free…clear the game. You are currently on the first floor, the lowest level of Aincrad. Make your way through each dungeon and defeat the Floor Boss, and you will advance to the next floor. Defeat the final boss on the one hundredth floor, and you will clear the game."

Is this guy for real? The beta testers didn't even make it to the 10th floor in one month.

"And finally, you can find a gift from me in your item storage. Please, do check for yourselves."

And there it is, right in the inventory. A gift from Akihiko himself, labeled as "mirror", somewhat hesitant I click on it. A literal pocket mirror appears before me. Glancing around myself I see a lot of people taking it out as well. Lifting it up to my face I can see it reflecting my avatar's face. What the hell is this supposed to mean? Suddenly people start shouting as they are surrounded by bright light. Scared, I turn around to Daath and Elina just before they are blurred by the light as well. I am blinded myself for a moment as the same happens to me. The shouts of fear don't stop, it feels as if people already started to die.

The light clears up after what feels like an eternity and I rub my eyes to try and make things clearer. I can't spot Daath or Elina anymore. Where the hell did they go?

"Al-Alshep?" says a blonde skinny guy in front of me.

"What? How do you know me?"

"Your gear...its colors, they are like Alshep's. You are Alshep, no? It's me, Daath."

No fucking way. I'm panicking, I look at my hands and then at my clothes. I reach for my face and touch it, feeling different than before. This isn't my avatar. It's...it's me. The real me! What is happening?

"What happened to my avatar?" I ask.

"I think it changed mine looks how I look in real life. It doesn't make sense…well it does, I think...it took the calibration data and replaced the avatars," he replies sounding very unsure.

No way can't this be happening. It takes me a bit to realize, but I guess he is right. Just looking around I am able to see players freaking out, touching their faces and bodies in shock. I see guys in girl's clothes and girls in male attires. This can't be happening.

"Where's Elina?" I ask.

Daath is about to speak when our attention is caught by what sounds like a little girl crying and sobbing. I can't believe what I'm seeing. A little brown haired girl with a purple cloak is sitting on the ground crying just a few feet away from us.

"Elina...?" Daath asks.

The little girl brings her tear filled face up and looks at me and Daath. She appears confused, but her tears stop flowing.

"Alshep? Daath?"

How old is she? She doesn't appear older than my fifteen year old cousin now. This game is rated fourteen and up, why would she be here? Then again...no one really cares about ratings when it comes to games nowadays. Daath helps her to her feet and she stands behind him, scared and shaking.

"All of you must be wondering why. Why would Kabaya Akihiko, the creator of SAO and the NeveGear, do all this? My goal has already been achieved. I wanted to create a world that I could observe and admire this is why I made Sword Art Online."

"Are you trying to play god?!"

I look at Daath who just yelled his lungs out. His face is filled with anger and rage. However Kabaya doesn't stop talking. He just keeps going.

"And now, it has all been fulfilled. This ends the tutorial of Sword Art Online's launch. I wish every player…the best of luck."

With that he dissolves slowly into thin air.

I hear nothing for a moment and then the sudden crash of something on the ground, followed by a girl's scream, and then, all hell starts to break loose. Shouting, screaming, crying. It is chaos. I suddenly feel someone pulling me up. It's Daath.

"Grab Elina and follow me. Don't fall behind."

He says that with a straight face, no emotion, I instinctively grab the little girl's hand and start running behind Daath. I might be too forceful about it, but I'm merely acting on impulse. Daath stops after running far apart from the plaza. The streets are dark and there is not a noise to be heard. He takes a deep breath and turns to us.

"Look, there's this room where you respawned during the beta. I refuse to believe Charles is dead. Let's go there. Maybe we'll find some sort of clue," he says.

Elina starts crying again and drops to her knees. Daath quickly gets on his knees as well and gets close to her.

"This was supposed to be fun! I don't want to die!" she cries.

Daath puts his hands on her shoulders and shakes her gently.

"Listen, you need to hold yourself together alright? I promise you won't die, but please, you have to be strong. Everything will be alright."

I stare while he tries to calm the small girl, I feel hopeless. There is so much information my mind I is still trying to process. What if my brother, or my sister rip the NerveGear off my head. That's nonsense they don't live with me, they don't even live in Japan, but, what if? What if something happened in the real world that I could not control? I would die. With no voice or choice in the matter, just like that. Dead.

Elina stops crying and gets on her feet. Daath smiles and then returns to his serious face.

"Alright, we'll have to head back to the Black Iron Castle. If I remember correctly the Room of Resurrection should be there."

I nod and follow as he starts walking. We walk for quite a while before I notice Elina is not with us. Turning my head back is enough to spot her. She is looking straight ahead with teary eyes. Without thinking I extend my arm and beckon her over.

"Come on, it's ok," I say.

She places her arm ahead of her and starts walking towards me until she reaches my hand. I can tell she is holding onto my hand tightly. We continue walking until we come across the main plaza again. It is mostly empty now, just a few groups of people stayed behind. Constant sobbing can be heard, except this time it isn't Elina.

Daath walks confidently in-front of us and without hesitation. Elina lets go of my hand and places herself between me and Daath.

"You two ok?" Daath asks.

"Yeah," I reply.

"Y…yes," says Elina.

"Good, we are almost there," he says.

Daath leads us through the door of a black castle and into a dim lighted corridor with what looks like a big black stone tablet on the back.

"That big stone wasn't there during the beta," says Daath.

"You sure this is the right place?" I ask.

Elina wanders deeper into the corridor and reaches the stone. As if she was looking for something.

"Yes, I'm completely sure. This is the room of resurrection."

"Monument of Life," says Elina.

With that, the big stone lights up and displays what appear to be words. I get closer and notice they are actually names. They are placed in alphabetical order all over the stone. I look around and quickly find mine in the first bunch.

"What is this thing?" I mutter.

"It's showing the character names…" Daath follows.

Elina goes along the tablet and stops near the middle. She gasps and clicks something. Daath goes over to her and I follow out of curiosity. What I see takes the air out of my lungs as I stand back clenching my fists really tight.

"No, this can't be," says Daath

Elina drops to her knees and starts crying again. Daath gets close to her and tries to calm her down once more.

"Please, come on. Please stop crying, it'll be alright I promise."

"Why are you sugar coating this shit?" I say harshly.

Daath looks at me and Elina stops crying as I say that. Daath's seems annoyed as he stands up.

"Don't you get it? That bastard was right, if we die here that's it. Game Over. If we die here, we'll die for real!"

Elina gathers strength to get up and stands behind Daath.

"I was just trying to make someone feel a little better you asshole," Daath replies.

"What point is there? You don't even know her."

He looks behind him and put his hand on Elina's shoulder.

"She is in my party," he replies.

I try to hold my frustration in and clench my fists tighter.

"And so are you," he adds

Suddenly I relax and look straight at him and Elina

"Now, I have a plan and I don't mind taking you two along. If anything it'll make things easier, and I guarantee you, we will survive. You have to trust me."

I stare at the ground and stay silent. After a bit Daath walks behind me as Elina follows him slowly. Elina stops next to me and Daath continues walking until he reaches the end of the hallway. I feel something tugging my arm.

"Please come with us…" she says.

I turn my head to the source of the sound and see Elina, she is trying to hold back tears and so am I. I don't know what to do.

"Are you coming as well, Alshep?" Daath asks from afar.

"Yeah…I…I'm sorry," I stifle.

Elina walks away and I walk behind her. Daath turns around and heads for the exit along with her. I stop at the end of the hallway and turn to the lit up stone. I feel tears run down my face as I remember what I saw on it. I won't give up man. I'll make it back…That's a promise.

-Charles-

-Disconnection-

-5:15 PM-

-November 6, 2022-

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/26/2016

Well this is the first chapter of my long running story. I've gone back and actually started thoroughly revising all of my chapters. Hopefully I can rid them of silly spelling or grammar mistakes as well as to fix some paragraphs or sentences in order for them to make more sense. Hopefully me going back all the way to my first chapters will do some good. This story is already around 80+ chapters and close to coming to an end, so before that happens I want to give it a good scrubbing and make sure I leave in the best shape I'm able to.

So what did you think? Good? Bad? I accept all kinds of reviews and feedback. So please, if you like what you read, please leave a review, if you don't, do so as well, I know my story is not perfect.

Thank you for reading! Hopefully, you will keep doing so!

Next Chapter: "Under The Night Sky"


	2. Chapter 2 - Under The Night Sky

**Chapter 2 - Under The Night Sky**

**November/6th/2022**

**Daath**

A million thoughts are going through my mind. Why would Akihiko do something like this? Why trap us all in a game of death? Why did I choose to play this damn game today? After all, I already played it for a damn month non-stop. I had other things to do back in the real world. I could've done that paper that was due for tomorrow, I could've gone out with my little sister to see that movie she wanted. I could've done…so many things. Here I am though; finding out a friend I met last month has just recently…retired from the world of the living. It is all too much for me to handle properly, so I went ahead and tried to assume the role of a leader. Something I'm really not fit for. I never stood out at school, I was never head of class. Yet here I am, asking two strangers to trust me with their lives.

"What is your plan?" Elina asks me.

"Well, first on the list is to wait for big guy," I reply.

"Big guy? You mean…that's a little mean, Daath," She says.

"I apologize, he got on my nerves a little back there."

She turns her head down. I think even she understands Alshep's little play back there was uncalled for. What annoys the most is his attitude, for a second there I thought he just threw all hope out of the window. Elina is thirteen, fourteen years tops, and I have this guy screaming about how we are all going to die. He really did get on my nerves.

"Sorry, I just feel sick right now," says Alshep as he comes out of the castle's door.

And I just feel a little sick of you.

"So, what's the plan?" he asks.

I start to think about things just that second. To be honest I didn't think that far ahead in terms of a plan. All I said in the now renamed "Monument of Life" was out of the blue, to keep our hopes up. To make them…trust me.

"Starting City is done for, I think it's actually dangerous to stay here any longer. I think our best bet is Tolbana Town but we'll have to get to Horunka Village first."

"What?" they say in sync.

Focus…these two aren't beta testers.

"Tolbana is the largest town after this one, at least on this floor. We could stay there for a while. It's safe; it has inns shops and food. If we want to make it there we'll have to stop at Horunka Village to rest and stock up."

This is a lie, Tolbana and Horunka are almost in opposite directions, but there is something that might help us in Horunka. It's something other than just shops and potions. I'm looking for a sword in particular.

"So, you want to take us through the grasslands? Isn't that dangerous?" Alshep asks.

"Not if you are with me, I know this place well," I say softly.

In a way I'm not exactly lying. It is dangerous to go to Horunka this early, but with a party of three I doubt it'll be much trouble. If we stick to the road we'll only encounter boars and some wolves, it is if we deviate to the forest that we'll maybe face trouble.

"Fine, where to then?" he asks.

"We need to go out of the city and northeast from there. This place is as big as your common prefecture so it'll still take us a bit to get to Horunka," I reply.

Alshep sighs and looks around a bit. I didn't notice until he took a look around, but it is almost pitch dark, for some reason the street lights aren't on yet. This bothers me a little since it is quite hard to see at night with no lights in SAO.

"It's getting dark…I don't like it when it's dark…" Elina mutters.

Starting City sells everything you needed to start playing SAO properly. It only makes sense to get some stuff quickly before heading out to Horunka. Maybe get a few potions, a lamp and if we have enough to go around, some armor.

"Alright then, follow me, and stay close," I order.

I start heading to the main road that leads out of the city with Alshep and Elina following me. An eerie feeling drops on me suddenly as I walk. Never before, not even during the beta did I feel so grounded to Sword Art Online. Something that I played for leisure and enjoyment suddenly became some kind of cage, a prison. The feeling in my feet as I walk, the cold air of the night going into my lungs, never did it feel as real as it does in this very moment. SAO has become my reality and there is nothing I can do about it.

"You sure you want to keep going straight? A large group of players seems to be ahead," says Alshep.

I stop and turn to my left just a bit before reaching the lake in-between the city gates and the main plaza. I stop near a small shop and wait for my partners to catch up.

"How much col do you guys have?" I ask.

Almost at the same time they bring up their menus. I do the same since I don't remember how much I'm currently carrying.

"I have four hundred and sixty eight," says Alshep.

"I…I have three hundred and five," says Elina.

"Ok, and with me we have a total of one thousand one hundred and thirty two," I say

The street lights suddenly turn on and the vendor behind me comes out of her house. We must make haste now that the city is up and running again, we need to buy what we need and get out of here as soon as possible.

"I'll buy a lamp and some armor. Elina, buy three potions and armor for yourself, you should have enough. Al, get some armor as well and save the rest maybe we'll need it later," I say firmly.

Expecting some backfire from this I look at Alshep as he approaches the street vendor. He says nothing nor looks at me. Good. I turn myself around and open the shops menu. I go through the items and find what I'm looking for quickly.

-Starter Oil Lamp: 50Col-

-Hard Leather Coat: 145Col-

-Total: 195Col-

-Buy- -Cancel-

I press the buy button and open my menu to equip the coat. Light envelops my upper body and a brown long coat appears over the starter set of clothes I'm wearing. My sheath strap goes over it as it appears on my body. Elina equips herself with two shoulder plates that stay beneath her cloak and Alshep purchases gauntlets that go up to his shoulders.

"Ok, you guys ready? We are going to run now," I say.

They nod and I turn around, heading to a side street to avoid the main road. We are better off not running into players right now. I may be over reacting, but if even beta testers went crazy with player killing I don't want to see how a crowd of stressed people reacts. Even if you can't PK inside a town or city, I don't want to risk it. At our pace we reach the city gates quickly and with no problems. I stop quickly to catch my breath.

"Is that Horunka?" Elina asks as she points to dim lights in the distance.

"Great guess, that's exactly it," I say.

She smiles and starts walking a bit in-front of me. Alshep walks past me and trails behind the girl. I start walking and bring up my menu to equip the lantern. The item materializes in front of me and starts shining brightly. It only lights up so much, but it'll give us some idea of where we are walking. Elina gasps and runs to me.

"Thank god, I thought we were going to walk the road in the dark," she says.

"He did mention he was getting a lamp," Alshep adds.

"Are you always this cynical?" I question.

He looks away and keeps walking. I look at Elina who is looking at him and our eyes meet for a moment before she sets them on the road. She doesn't seem to dislike this man, but I'm not sure if we'll be able to stay together for long.

"Stop," Alshep huffs as he unsheathes his sword.

He places it in front of him as he charges a sword skill up. What is he doing? There shouldn't be any enemies so close to the city. To my surprise a group of red shining eyes suddenly becomes visible in front of Alshep. Wolves…crap. I hand the lamp over to Elina and tell her to keep her weapon close and at the ready. I reach for my back and unsheathe my sword as I get close to Alshep.

"Why aren't they attacking?" he asks.

"They are examining our group," I whisper.

I ready a sword skill as I get next to him.

"Should we take initiative then?" he says.

"I don't think they will be too hard to take on. How many did you count?"

"Four," he replies.

He looks at me and we nod to each other. I let go and the sword quickly connects me with a fatal blow to one of the wolves. I see Alshep do the same and quickly dispatches of a wolf as well. Well at least he compensates on being battle proficient. The next wolf rapidly approaches me and I kick it to my left. Lifting my sword I stab the ground through the animal and kill it in the process. I see a flash of light close to Alshep confirming he's killed the other one.

"Is that it?" I shout.

He nods and sheathes his sword. This is bad…there's no result screen. I turn to the small spot of light with Elina in the middle and see two small red dots treading behind her.

"Elina! Behind you!"

I see her turn around quickly, but the wolf lunges over her faster than I expected. Elina starts screaming as the wolf bites and scratches her. I start running, but I fear I might not be quick enough. The wolf tears through her cloak and keeps attacking her. Suddenly the wolf bursts into light just as I reach the spot. A frightened Elina sits before me with a sword at hand and a scared face.

"Are you ok?!" Alshep asks as he arrives.

The result screen pops up, but I quickly discard it as I get on my knee. Her health points reached the red and she is just a few more scratches away from saying goodbye. I grab her shoulder and shake her lightly. She directs her sword to me and swipes quickly with it.

"Get away!" She screams.

"Calm down, ok? You are ok. Take one of the potions and get on your feet, alright?" I say gently.

She puts away her weapon and stands up. Just out of the city and she is already about to die. I can't help but to feel responsible and apologize to her a couple of times before we keep going to Harunka. I can't help but to picture my sister when I see her. They don't look alike, but it is the fact that she is young and frightened that makes me think of my sister.

A few minutes of walking are all it takes to make Starting City look like tiny dots of light in the distance. Harunka becomes a little clearer as we walk, but it is still a bit away from us. In the distance I can see a spot of light moving quickly to Horunka. Perhaps it's another player? If it is, it has to be a beta tester. I don't think any new players would think of heading out of Starting City this soon. Let alone visit Horunka when Tolbana is closer to the City itself.

"I feel I'm close to level two," Alshep says.

"Oh yeah, that reminds me. How do I know when I'm going to level up?" Elina asks.

"Well, there isn't really anything in the UI that tells you how close you are. Like Al said, you just…well, feel it."

It took a few hours to reach level two in the beta, a couple more to reach three. It was after level eight when it really felt like it took days. As we get closer to Horunka, enough to be able to see a couple of buildings another pack of wolves appears on our right side. I'm already readying my sword when Elina presses the lamp against my side.

"Let me…try," she mumbles.

Unsure and almost unwillingly I take the lamp as she walks towards the wolves with Alshep on her side. Al unsheathes his weapon and Elina does the same along with her shield. With a sword skill on the ready he attacks the first wolf, killing it in one swift blow. He backs up and quickly prepares for the next one. Elina charges at the wolf closest to her, with incredible strength, she slams the animal to the ground with her shield, she then stabs it two times while it's down. I stand impressed; the sudden change in attitude is quite drastic. She looks fierce and determined in battle. After they are done with the pack, again the result screen doesn't show up. I place the lamp on the ground and unsheathed my sword as I see a big pair of eyes in front of my party.

"We got a pack leader! Be ready!" I yell.

Elina starts walking back to me with her weapons at the ready. Alshep decides to do something stupid and naively attacks head-on, barely being able to graze the big wolf.

"Yeah! We can tak-" he was interrupted as the leader sends him flying several feet away from me.

"Elina, do you remember how to switch?" I ask.

She nods and I charge at the wolf. He swipes at me with its paw, but I dodge it and quickly try to connect a few hits at its chest. I jump back and look at Elina.

"Switch!"

She immediately jumps in with a sword skill and does a three hit combo on the beast's side. She sides steps and looks back at me.

"Switch!" she yells.

Looking carefully at the beast I ready a sword skill and wait for it to lunge at me. It takes my bait jumping at me, I barely manage to side step around it and slash vertically with my sword. I see Alshep on the corner of my eye rushing at the wolf with his sword up. I look at him and nod as he does the same.

"Go for it! Switch!" I scream.

He growls as he runs and jumps at the wolf's face.

"Take this!" he roars.

He slashes its face and lands on his feet as he watches it topple in-front of him. The result screen appears before me.

-Result-

-Exp: 132-

-Col: 312-

-Items: 0-

I look up at my health bar and see that I leveled up. Well, that's a start.

"Woohoo! Got a rare sword!" shouts Alshep.

He equips it in his hand, a long slick blade with fur on the crossguard. Elina is jumping out of joy and starts to head for the lamp that I set on the ground a few moments ago.

"Hey Alshep!" I say.

He turns to look at me just as Elina arrives behind me with the lamp. I extend my arm and give him a really awkward thumbs up.

"Great job, man," I yell.

He sheathes his sword and walks over to us. Just as he is about to meet us he raises his hand above his head.

"You did well too," he says.

I smile and meet his hand with mine for a high-five. It has got to be the most satisfying high-five I've ever received. We managed to beat what in a way is a mid-level boss, and we did it in an extraordinary manner. He turns to Elina and ruffles her hair a bit.

"You did well too. I saw it all," he exclaims.

Elina blushes and pushes away his hand, but then giggles. I can't help but to smile at that and feel good about this journey so far.

"And here I thought you two wouldn't get along," I say.

They both look at me and laugh a little. They stop and look at each other before laughing some more. I join in the little laugh and then start walking towards Horunka. Alshep walks up my right and Elina up on my left side.

"I uhmm… thought things over. I want to say sorry. You know, about how I acted earlier and stuff," he says.

I grin to myself and pat his back.

"It's alright, we are in the same party. I'm sure things will just get harder."

With that Elina turns to her feet and Alshep sighs a little. After all I just keep amazing myself with these on the spot speeches.

"But as long as we stay together, and get stronger. I'm sure, I'm absolutely sure we can stay alive," I add.

Elina holds my hand and Al smiles while giving me a hard pat in the back.

"You sure know what to say," he laughs.

If only you knew…

* * *

We finally reach Harunka. I lift my arms and stretch out, groaning a bit in the process. Well that was awfully tiring. Alshep sits on a crate along the wall of one of the first buildings and Elina on the floor next to it.

"Hey! Not that fast! We need to at least get some rooms at the inn," I say.

"Ehh? But I'm tired," says Elina.

Alshep gets up and grabs Elina's arm.

"Come on, he is right. That way we will be safe," he says.

Well, before that. I think it's time I come clean as to why we came here. I'm just about to speak when a player comes up running behind me. He stops all of the sudden, he is heaving, and trying to catch his breath. He then opens his menu to change swords. It catches my eye, that's exactly the blade I'm looking for. This guy beat me to the quest. I'm sure I can still get it though. The player has black hair and looks startled, his clothes are the regular starter set. A blue shirt along with the standard leather chest piece nothing too fancy. He is either very skilled or didn't care to upgrade.

"Hey, are you alright?" Alshep asks.

The player looks at us as he sheaths his blade. He says nothing. He spastically looks away and starts running out of sight.

"Geez…what was that about?" Alshep groans.

I sigh as I realize it is time to tell the truth.

"We are not here to resupply," I say trying to hide my face

Al's and Elina's attention finds itself centered on me.

"What did you just say?" Alshep says as he gets closer.

"We are here…for a quest…"

I see as Al clenches his palms into fists and Elina catches up to him to grab his arm. This little girl may have just spared me a punch in the face.

"Are you freaking kidding me right now? We almost died outside of town for a stupid quest?!"

I nod and look away. I knew what I was doing. I knew it could backfire like it is.

"Look, this will help us. We'll get stronger and the item we'll get will spare us a lot of trouble," I say.

He growls at me and turns around. Elina looks worried and stands between me and him.

"Ok, fine…whatever. Where to?" he says.

Elina stares at me with a pouting face and for some reason it makes me feel horrendously bad. I would rather get punched in the face than have to stare at her disappointed expression.

"The NPC is right this way…follow me," I sigh.

As they follow me around I feel their eyes stabbing my back. It is almost painful. Almost.

* * *

"So we just get this Ovule thing, huh?" Alshep teases.

"Yes," I reply.

"You say they drop from these Nepents things?" he continues.

"Yes," I say.

"The ones that have these flowers on their head?" he adds.

"Yes," I say frustrated.

"He already explained this in the village Al!" says Elina.

"Thank you," I mutter.

This guy sure knows when to be an ass and when to be the nicest person in the world. It has been a bit since we left the village and headed into the woods to find the Nepents. We'll be searching for regular ones at first, but if we spot one with a red flower we are to defeat it quickly and return to the village since it will drop the item we need to complete the quest. Absolutely for no reason we should attack a Nepent with fruit on its head. The result of that…could be deadly.

"There," Elina whispers while pointing to a Nepent.

"Good eye. We should be careful. These things are a level higher than we are. Since we are three it shouldn't be much trouble, but still, be careful and watch out for the ones with fruit," I say.

We all nod at each other and approach the Nepent carefully. We all ready up our weapons and get in formation around the enemy.

"Now!" Elina shouts as she closes in to attack.

She hits it four times before yelling "switch" for Alshep to step in. He charges at the Nepent and slices quickly through it. To my surprise his attack kills it and the enemy disappears.

"Wow this sword sure is something," he says to himself.

"Don't let your guard down just now, we are just getting started," I say.

We continue our battle through the forest with no luck in finding a Flower Nepent. We collect Col and Exp like nobody's business, but still, to no avail. Elina acquires a new shield and I get some shoulder plates. Al finds another sword but refuses to use it since his "Wolf Blade" is better.

"How many more do we have to kill? I'm already level three here," Alshep says.

"I don't know. It's bound to be here somewhere, just a little more, come on," I reply.

"Oh! There look! It's one with a flower!" Alshep shouts.

I turn around and spot it as it spawns behind us. Sweet, just in time. Now, to cut it down.

"Attack!" I shout.

Alshep goes in with a skill and slices the Nepent from the side. He makes it stagger and opens its defense for another attack.

"Switch," he says.

Elina jumps and hits it hard with her shield making it step back.

"Switch!" she yells.

I ready a sword skill and run towards the enemy. I quickly avoid it as it tries to get me with its mouth. With the flower at ground level I take my chance and attack its stem which is coming right out of the monster's head. My sword quickly cuts through and the Nepent bursts into pieces. The battle result pops up and I acquire the item we were looking for.

"Was that it?" Elina asks.

I nod and look at my inventory.

-Little Nepent's Ovule-

We put away our weapons and start walking towards Horunka Village again.

"Well that didn't take long whatsoever," says Al.

"Are you really like this all the time?" I ask.

He starts laughing and pushes me playfully as we walk. We reach Horunka again and meet with the NPC who gave us the quest.

"Thank you so much, I am forever in your debt. Please, take this as a token of my gratitude."

That line of dialogue alone isn't cliché at all. Since we were a party it only gives us one item. We talk about it and decide I should keep it since Alshep likes his current sword and Elina said she likes short swords better. I go through my equipment and change my sword for the Anneal Blade. I unsheathe it to take a look at it. A grip of a simple design; the blade starts out narrow then widens and then becomes narrow and widens again before becoming straight , it looks better than it did on the beta.

"So that's the sword huh?" Al asks.

I nod and put it away as we walk down Horunka Village.

"Can we go to the inn now?" Elina asks with tired eyes.

"Of course, but…it isn't really an inn," I say.

"I'm so close to punching you in the face…" Al grunts.

We walk to an NPC house and I knock on the door gently. An old woman comes out to greet us.

"Excuse me, do you have any rooms for rent?" I ask.

She nods and lets us into her home. She explains her price is 40 Col a night per room. We decide to stay there and rest up for the coming day. We are given access to our respective rooms and we wave each other good night.

In my room I switch to town clothing and lay myself on the bed. This day has only been tiring. Having to sleep in a game…it doesn't feel right. I wonder for a brief moment what is of my unconscious body back in the real world. Is my family ok? Do they know what happened to me? How is my sister doing? These are questions I won't have an answer for in a while. I roll to my side and close my eyes, but I receive a message.

-From: Elina  
-To: Daath, Alshep  
-Subject: -  
-Message: I just remembered we'll have to sleep in this world…

She is right…as of now there's no way around it.

-From: Alshep  
-To: Daath, Elina  
-Subject: Reply  
-Message: I know it's hard but just try not to think about. Ignorance is bliss.

This guy...he has the weirdest mood swings. In the end, he is a nice guy though. I feel like I've bonded with these two today.

-From: Elina  
-To: Daath, Ashep  
-Subject: Reply  
-Message: I guess you are right…Well…good night you two. See you in the morning.

-From: Alshep  
-To: Daath, Elina  
-Subject: Reply  
-Message: Good night.

I could've done so many things today…so many things.

-From: Daath  
-To: Alshep, Elina  
-Subject: Reply  
-Message: Good night…

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

For some reason re-revising these chapters is taking me more than it should, hopefully they are turning out to be better versions than before, then again they might not be perfect. Nevertheless this chapter holds a special place in my heart since it is here where I think I really establish who these characters are and stuff.

For those who've read the novels you might be able to tell who that other player was. Kudos if you spotted the brief cameo!

If you like what you read, please leave a review, it's always nice to see what people have to say about my story, be it good or bad.

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Netiquette"


	3. Chapter 3 - Netiquette

**Chapter 3 - Netiquette**

**November/26th/2022**

**Alshep**

"That's the last of them," says Daath as he puts away his sword.

The result screen appears before me and I dismiss it without looking. I'm too tired to give a damn. I sheathe my sword and sit on the grass.

"I just reached level eight," says Elina.

"Good for you," I say as I lay on my back.

She gives me her usual pouty face and sits next to me. The sky is starting to break red from the sunset and I close my eyes for a brief moment. Wind brushes by and I can feel the grass move around me. It's sickening, I'm starting to get sick of it. Actually I'm already fed up with everything.

"Don't you think this blows?" I mutter.

"Hmm, what does?" Elina asks.

"You know, the wind, the grass, the sun. It's starting to feel…off. I don't know how to explain it," I reply.

I hear Daath sigh as he gets closer to us.

"Goddammit man, I thought we were done talking about this," he says.

"Well I'm bringing the topic back. Why does it all just feel weird?"

Elina sighs as well and holds her legs close to her. We talked about this a few days back in the inn we are staying at in Tolbana. Sword Art Online is a game after all, however detailed it may be I can't get accustomed to it as my reality. It bothers me greatly. Whatever I found exciting and amusing about Sword Art Online at first I know find disturbing and weird. As far as I know my body is lying on a bed somewhere. I am perhaps being fed someway, haven't felt hunger or thirst since a little after the second day. Yet I want to eat, I want to drink, and I want to take a bath.

The NerveGear stimulates the senses, this means I can taste, feel, smell, hear, and see. I can taste food but, it's not going to my belly it's not feeling me up as it should. I just get that brief moment of glee when my taste buds are stimulated. I can drink water but it only does the same as food. Don't get me started on baths or showers. Daath explained last week when Elina wanted to take a bath that the only problem with the NerveGear and Sword Art Online have with water is its accuracy when trying to replicate the feeling of it. It turns out weird. Elina explained a feeling different to mine, but I just felt as if I submerged myself on some gooey liquid. Hence, I have not bathed or taken a shower since then. It's not like I smell or anything, thankfully the game doesn't really give me any body odor.

"It feels weird because you keep reminding us it feels weird," he says.

I shut my mouth up and open my menu. My sword is losing durability as well as my upper armor. I have enough Col to either buy new armor or repair the current one. I haven't gotten too interested in enhancements since I really don't know how they work and I don't know any blacksmiths.

"He doesn't have to remind us it feels weird for it to feel…weird," Elina mumbles.

"Great, now you got her all mellow again," Daath grunts.

"It's not his fault…" she says.

I sit up and look around as the sun starts to hide completely. It's almost time to start heading back to the inn. We've come up with a little routine in the last days. It consists of: Waking up, if you even had the luck of falling asleep that is. Then meeting in the first floor of the inn for breakfast, which is also optional. Elina always has something to eat, Daath has bread once in a while and I recently just started skipping meals completely. It's not like I feel hungry anyways. I've also recently become a more bitter man than I already was. I have been asked several times to tone down my sarcasm and to try to be a little friendlier to Elina. I have nothing against her, she is nice to me and I'm just nice to her in my own way. Daath would surely kick me out of the group if I showed him how I treat people I don't care about. After breakfast we go out to hunt a little, it keeps our senses keen and trained, but it gets a little boring after a while. Later on we tackle some quests or just go exploring to see if there's something we've missed in the last week or so. If we find nothing else to do for the rest of the day we go around town. We actually just walk and talk till the day breaks. It is then, back to the inn. Rinse and repeat.

I get on my feet and stretch my arms. Elina gets up as well and looks at Daath and then she looks at me for a few seconds. She does this whenever she wants to say something. I little habit of hers I've picked up on.

"Is it ok if we hunt a little longer?" she asks.

"Huh? Why? You usually just want to head back to the inn," I say.

"Well, I…I don't want to sleep," she says in a low voice.

"Great job, idiot," Daath says to me.

"No no…It's not his fault. I just haven't got used to it. It just doesn't feel right. The sheets and the pillows I hate them. I don't like it," she adds.

Is it just that? Really? I haven't been able to sleep some nights but, it isn't because of the bed. It's just because when we go to bed that I start thinking about what the hell is going on with my body in the real world.

"Fine fine, we can hunt a little more," says Daath as he starts walking more into the forest.

I start following him when I feel Elina tugging my arm.

"Please, don't get him grumpy," she whispers.

"Sorry, I can't help but to voice what I feel sometimes."

She starts walking and we both match a slow pace to follow Daath from a few feet away.

"I know, I've noticed, and you are a little rude sometimes too. It's just that if he gets grumpy, then you get grumpy and then I just get caught up in the middle of it. I don't like it," she says.

That makes me feel bad and I scratch my head as I nod. Apparently I do have to seriously start watching how I talk.

"You know, you are like a big…little sister, if that makes any sense," I say as I pat her head.

I can't help but to think of what she said earlier about the bed and just go ahead and ask what I got in mind.

"What's the real reason you don't want to go to sleep?"

She looks at her feet and we walk silently for a few seconds.

"Well?" I pressure.

"I find it hard, it's impossible for me to sleep unless I'm exhausted. Otherwise I just stay up all night thinking. It's scary sleeping in this world."

Damn, I should really learn when to shut up.

"There's a pack of wolves up ahead," Daath says.

I take out my sword and pat Elina on her head again.

"I'm sorry, I don't like it either. I don't like anything about this world right now, but it's where we live in right now. I'll make an effort…if you do so too," I say.

She smiles at me and takes out her shield and sword.

"Ok," she says in a cheery tune.

We start running to Daath and go past him with our weapons ready. Taking on wolves has become something trivial. Insects, worms and some of the enemies deeper into the forest are the ones that give us a tough time now. I remember the first day a little pack of wolves was enough to almost get us killed. I myself have had about two near death encounters so far. One against a bunch of wolfs that took us by surprise and another when I accidentally attacked a Little Nepent with a fruit on its head. Daath was more than right, it is deadly to do so. It attracts a massive group of the things and it nearly got us killed. That night was also when Elina had a bit of nervous breakdown. She didn't stop crying and kept begging for her mom. Thankfully that was just a minor bump in the road and we were able to move on rather quickly.

I strike a wolf and kill it with a single attack, another one jumps at me, but I slice it up before it even gets the chance to touch me. Elina has gotten a liking to hitting with her shield and then attacking her enemy with quick swipes of her sword. She has shown a strong defense in the past days and it made me consider trying a shield. I found myself not being good with coordination so I have postponed that, indefinitely.

"This is getting too easy," I say while striking the last wolf near me.

"Don't get too cocky. You never know when we might get overwhelmed," says Daath as he kicks a wolf out of the way.

"Why do you two like kicking and hitting so much? Don't your swords do enough damage?" I say as I put my blade away.

"I find it useful, versatile, and don't want to only have to rely in my sword in the worst case scenario," he replies.

"My shield is actually part of my weapons, I think it's just second nature to use it," says Elina.

I scratch my head. I don't even know if hitting is a skill. I know the sword is one by default, one handed or two handed, whichever the player chooses to use, but hitting? I just find it unnecessarily dangerous.

"Anyways, let's keep at this for a while longer. We can head to town afterwards," I say.

After one or two hours give or take, we start heading back to Tolbana in pitch black darkness. The town seems lively tonight. Tolbana was a ghost town just a few days ago. Only a handful of players which we later found out were mostly beta testers were there. Other players had just recently started to arrive a few days ago. If it wasn't because of Daath practically being our mentor, my guess is that Elina and I might just be arriving here as well.

"You forgot the lamp," I huff.

"I'm…I'm sorry we left in a hurry today," says a little girl clinging to my arm.

"We agreed assigning the lamp to you would make this…issue, pop up less often," Daath says.

"Now even you are picking on me?" she says.

Daath laughs a little and apologizes.

"You are rather clumsy though, there's no denying that," I tease.

"I…I…I just get nervous…th-that's all!"

"And yo-you stutter a whole lo-lot too," says Daath.

"Woah, leave the teasing to me," I interrupt.

He laughs and then I do too as we enter the town. New players arrive with us and wonder around as we head to the inn.

"A lot of people are starting to get here," Daath sighs, "It's going to get troublesome soon…"

"Why would it?" I ask.

"More people usually means more problems. That's just how it goes," He responds.

"Ok, seriously. Leave the being negative part to me, that's all I've got after you took teasing away from me just now," I joke.

He sighs and gets his serious face going. Slightly tipped eyebrows, his mouth closed tight, his eyes barely moving, not even blinking.

"I mean it, if we don't clear this floor soon it'll just get crowded."

"Well what do you expect? They haven't even found the door for the boss, and we don't even go near that maze," I say.

He sighs again and continues walking.

"He's been…very quiet lately…" Elina whispers to me.

I nod. Perhaps something is bothering him but, if something I've learned from the past weeks is that he isn't usually the type to open up and say what's bothering him.

"Let's try to get him to talk tonight," I whisper back.

"Ok. You are going to eat something, no?" she says.

I huff and shake my head quickly as she looks at me.

"Come on! You promised to make an effort," she whines.

I need to learn to keep my damn mouth shut. I take my last few steps into the inn and sit down on the nearest table. The place is filled with people sitting at other tables, there's that chattering noise that I remember from food courts in real life in the background.

"Fine, get me something along with your food."

She giggles and wonders off towards the inn keeper. Daath slowly sits down in-front of me and slumps over the table.

"What is it with you lately?" I say while poking his head.

"Ahh…I don't know…" he grunts.

"Is something bothering you?"

He shakes his head and puts his hand over his head to stop my poking.

"How many people do you think have died?" he says out of the blue.

I cough and clear my throat. So that's what he is thinking about.

Death.

"Three hundred, four hundred, give or take," I mutter.

"How the fuck can you say that with a straight face?" he comes back.

"Look, as long as it's not us," I say.

He looks at me for a few seconds and then reaches for my shirt's collar to pull me close to him. People in the inn suddenly go silent and start looking at us.

"Did you forget about Charles?! What the hell is wrong with you?!" he yells.

"Don't you even dare to think that for a second," I say as I push him away, "Charles was my friend, I knew him from real life. I went to school with him, but now he is dead! Dead! What do you want me to do about it?!"

He slumps down on his seat and avoids looking at me.

"I don't know what happened to you these past days. You've been acting really weird, man, but if mortality is what's worrying you, I see no point in focusing in it if we are still alive," I say, "and it's all…thanks to you…dumbass."

He lifts his head and looks at me, he gives me a smirk. I smile to myself and sit down.

"Oh you are so full of yourse-" I say before getting interrupted.

"Hey, thanks," he says briefly.

"Yeah, whatever."

A blushing Elina walks over to us with a tray.

"Geez you two sure know how to make a scene…"

Daath and I apologize in unison. She sets the tray with three bowls on the table and gives me and Daath what appears to be some kind of stew.

"I didn't ask you for food," Daath says.

"I know but you are going to eat tonight because I say so," Elina says quickly.

Daath appears surprised and looks at his bowl as Elina starts to eat. He then looks at me with a confused frown, I can't help but laugh a bit.

"Yeah haha, you better listen to her Daath," I say while laughing.

"Oh, and you too mister," she says as she puts a spoonful of stew in my mouth.

Daath starts laughing loud and hard like a hyena and Elina joins him. Embarrassed by a little girl I hide my face as I swallow the food. We continue our little late dinner and have a lively chat through the rest of the night. Before we know it its well past midnight and we are still talking in the inn's tables. Only a couple of people are nearby but thankfully they mind their own business.

"Hmm…what would you say is the thing you miss the most of the real world?" I ask.

We have gotten to a point during the dinner where we started talking about our lives back in reality. We didn't go too much into personal stuff nor names, but we did get to find out some of each other's likes and dislikes. Thankfully the question I ask didn't really poke any wounds.

"I think…my doggies," says Elina, "What about you?"

"Well, I think I'll have to say music. I don't know why the musicians here just won't play something a little more upbeat. Don't even get me started on the field's background music," I reply, "What about you, Daath?"

"Hmm…what do I miss the most?" he repeats.

"Yeah, I believe that's what we asked," I say teasingly.

"You promise you won't laugh?" he asks.

Both Elina and I nod, anxious for an answer.

"Well, that sensation you got when you peed," he says.

Haha…wow.

"Nastyyy," Elina says while sticking out her tongue.

I start laughing and hit the table a few times.

"That is so true though," I say and keep laughing.

"Aww come on, you can't say you don't miss that, Eli," says Daath as he pokes her sides.

Elina starts giggling and tries to push Daath away.

"Well, just a bit hehe," she admits.

I smile and sit back a little while I have sip of water. These are the kind of moments that really make me happy in here. They make me forget that I'm trapped, these moments are the ones worth surviving for. The conversation keeps going for a while longer, so much that I lose track of time. Daath goes to his room but I decide to stay and talk with Elina some more.

"I've been wondering for a while now but, I never knew how to ask," she says softly.

"Hmm? What is it?" I reply.

"How old are you? You seem to be kind of as old as my sister."

"Well I'm sixteen, I'm turning seventeen in just a few days actually. If my memory serves me right that is."

Saying that suddenly makes me a little sad and I look at my empty mug of water. I won't be celebrating my birthday it seems. Unpleasant thoughts of the real world come to mind and I sulk a little.

"Why didn't you mention that earlier?!" she says after taking a bite out of some bread.

"It just didn't seem…important I guess," I grumble.

She gives me a somewhat stern look and finishes eating her bread.

"Mine…was three days ago."

I widen my eyes in surprise, out of the three of us I thought she would be the only one to never keep something a secret. I thought she would be the one to just say important things like that.

"And here you are getting upset that I didn't tell you," I mutter.

She looks down at the table and then to me, she laughs without meaning it and her smile turns to a small frown.

"I'm fourteen now."

I get up and grab her arm to pull her along with me. She trips a little, but quickly matches my speed. I exit the inn and head a little into town to find an equipment shop.

"Hey, what are you doing? Where are we going?" she says, trying to get my hand off her arm.

"Hey, don't fight. I'm trying to do something nice for once," I say while I keep pulling her.

She stops fighting and just follows me at a brisk pace. Arriving at the shop I quickly open the vendor's menu. Elina stands idle behind me, fidgeting around a little.

"Al, seriously, what are you doing?"

"You use short swords no? I interrupt, "and shields right?"

She nods slowly and I get my attention back to the shop's menu.

-Vorpal Short sword: 1235Col-  
-Azure Buckler: 1056Col-  
-Total: 2291Col-  
-Buy- -Cancel-

It isn't a cheap price, but I think it is ok given the reason. I buy the equipment and select it out of my inventory to give it to Elina. She takes the sword and shield from my hands and looks straight me.

"F-for me? Really?" she says with a blushing face.

"Happy belated birthday Elina," I say while smiling.

She equips her gifts and gives the sliver blade a few swings, the blue-ish buckler looks nice and has a really nice circular shape. I just now notice, but the sword has what looks like carvings on the sides. It makes it look great and gives a "legendary" feeling to it. Elina is smiling and giggling while trying out her new gear in the middle of the early morning. Something on the distance catches my eye, a shadowy figure running towards us. I quick look above it and I was able to see an orange cursor over its head.

An orange cursor only means bad things. Daath told us orange cursors are given to players that commit infractions, these being: Stealing, PK-ing or hurting a player outside of a safe area.

"Come here," I say as I pull Eli close to me and hide with her on the alley nearby.

A heaving man runs through the streets, but trips as it gets near where we were standing close to the shop. We see the man fall down and Elina gasps. I quickly put my hand over her mouth to avoid any other sound coming out of her.

"Shush," I whisper.

"There he is! Get him!" a voice down the street says.

Two guys and a girl dressed completely in white come running from behind the fallen man. They violently take a hold of him while he tries to get up.

"We got him Klaus!" shouts the girl.

After the girl says that a man in a fancy white attire and red hair steps into our line of vision. I can't help to notice his cursor is the only green out of the four people standing in the street.

"Good, take him outside of town. Teach him to never steal from the White Snakes again," he orders.

Elina gets my hand off her mouth and breathes in deeply.

"You have to do something Al," she says.

"It's not my problem, for all I know that guy they are holding is no better than them."

She pushes me deeper into the alley and pouts.

"If you are not going to do something about it, I will."

Dammit Elina. I sigh and grunt loudly as I put her behind me. I take a deep breath and step into the street. I clear my throat loudly and get their attention.

"What are you looking at?" says the girl.

"Four scumbags," I say.

I have to seriously start thinking before words start coming out of my mouth.

"What did you just say?" says one of the guys.

"Did I stutter?"

The man dressed fancily in the middle starts to laugh and walks past his minions to take a look at me.

"Do you want to get yourself hurt or what?" he yells.

Elina comes out of the alley and stands behind me, I see other people coming up the street on my left. They stand a few feet away, looking curiously at what's happening.

"Leave that guy alone," I yell back.

The man dressed in white smirks at me and walks closer.

"Are you seriously going to risk your life for a man you don't even know? This guy stole from us, it's only natural for us to carry out punishment," he explains.

I turn to Elina and make sure she understands this is her fault with a frown. She steps back a little and I can hear her say sorry. I wave my hand trying to say it's ok as I look in front of me.

"I don't give two shits about what that guy did, but you are not going to hurt him," I say as I get closer to the red haired man.

More people start coming out of the inns and pile on the sides and ends of the street. This might actually help me, a crowd might scare this sassy asshole away.

"It looks like we've got a crowd!" he says, "what do you say if I teach them and you not to mess with the White Snakes!"

Well there goes plan B. Thankfully I'm just the kind of guy who doesn't mind getting into a fight.

"Great, that will just make it that much more satisfying when I kick your teeth in," I reply.

People around us start to talk and mutter to each other.

"Are they really going to fight? In the middle of town?"

The apparent leader of the White Snakes makes a disgusted frown and takes out his sword. He places a red looking sword with a jagged blade in-front of him. As soon as he gets on a stance I receive a duel confirmation. The type of duel reads "Half Loss Mode".

"You and me chubby man! First to lose half of their HP loses!" he growls.

"Fine by me flame head," I say as I confirm the duel.

"The name is Klaus," he says.

"I couldn't give a rat's ass."

A timer with sixty seconds appear on top of us along with our names separated by the letters "VS".

-Klaus VS Alshep-

"I never meant for you to go this far! Even in this kind of duel you can die!" Elina cries behind me.

As the timer clocks down I turn around put my hand on her shoulder trying to reassure her.

"This is me doing something," I say softly.

She looks at me and nods as I reach for my sword. I unsheathe it slowly, trying to take advantage of every intimidation technique I've ever heard of.

-10-  
-9-  
-8-

The others player around are literal bystanders, no one says anything nor does anything to stop this. This kind of disgusts me and angers me greatly. I recall just minutes ago I was doing the same, but it's different when there's just one person as to when there are about twenty.

-3-  
-2-  
-1-

Klaus lets out a battle cry and starts running towards me. Thanks to the amazing teachings from Daath himself I remember something he did a couple of days ago when fighting some worms near the forest. As Klaus gets closer I sheathe my sword quickly. Everyone gasps around me and Klaus just gives me a shit eating grin. When he is about two feet away from me I kick dirt up from the floor to mess with his eyes. As soon as he closes his eyes from the dirt I step forwards and punch him straight in the face, knocking him to the ground. The feeling of punching is new, I never tried it before, but it sends a satisfying wave of pleasure up my spine.

People gasp and cheer accordingly as I stand unscathed above him. That didn't do much damage to his hit points but I'm sure his self-esteem is way below zero right now. He grunts on the floor and tries to get up, but I place my boot on his chest as I take out my sword.

"Please. You can end it here, Klaus," I say.

He growls and moves under my boot trying to reach for his sword that landed just a few inches away from his hand. I slowly bring the end of my blade to his throat.

"Don't let this turn ugly, give up the duel."

He tries to free himself for a while longer and finally realizes it won't get him anywhere. With anger he brings up a screen and gives up the duel with a click.

-Winner: Alshep!-

People start screaming and cheering as they start to get close to me. I sheathe my weapon and feel as Elina hugs me from behind. Klaus gets on his feet and avoids looking my way. The man that was being held breaks free and starts running in the opposite direction of Klaus's minions. With a big smile he runs towards me and hugs me wildly.

"Thank you so much, damn if it wasn't cause you showed up. I could be dead right now," he says as he lets go.

"That was amazing Al!" Elina says.

I smile calmly and look as Klaus disappears into town with his partners. I reach for the orange cursor player's arm and shake him.

"Don't steal from groups idiot, not again. You might not get lucky next time," I scold.

He nods quickly about eight times and smiles before running away jumping in glee. I turn to Elina in the midst of the cheering crowd and smile as she does the same. I start making my way through the crowd with her when I receive a message.

From: Daath  
To: Alshep  
Subject:-  
Message: Nicely done, quite the show.

I look at the inn from afar and see Daath peeking out the window with his thumb up in the air. I give him a thumbs up too and walk towards the building with Elina. We make our way in and head for the stairs to get up to our rooms.

"Th…thank you Al," she says shyly.

I turn around as I'm about to reach the door to my room.

"It's ok, no need to thank me," I say.

"No, really. I mean it, thanks for everything today," she says with a big smile, "I'm sure I'll be able to sleep well tonight."

Hearing her say that makes me happy I did what I did.

"I'm glad to hear that," I say as I open my door, "You know where to find me if you need anything," I add as I walk in.

Before closing my door I see her blush and nod at me.

"See you tomorrow! Good night!" she says as she disappears into the hallway.

I close the door and sit on my bed. I take out my sword and quickly examine it. Its durability and sharpness reached a dangerous low after we were out hunting all the evening. If I had used it in the duel I would've fought with a dull blade on its breaking point. I change my clothes to something less heavy and lay on my back while letting out a big sigh. Talking about cutting it close. I'm about to rest my eyes when I hear a knock on the door.

"Who's there?" I ask.

"It's…uh…It's me, Elina," says the voice behind the door.

I get up and open the door to see her with a pillow under her arm, wearing pajamas in front of me.

"Nice PJs," I tease, "can't sleep?" I say while yawning a little.

She nods and covers her mouth with her pillow.

"Alright, come in."

She enters quickly and goes straight to my bed, I pull a chair from near the window to have a place to sit down on. She has been visiting my room to talk some days now. I don't mind it, it helps her get tired and then she falls asleep. Then I also fall asleep, she is...soothing, in a way.

"So what do you want to talk about today?" I ask while sitting down.

She lies down on her belly and puts her pillow under her elbows.

"Do you really…absolutely hate this world?"

"Of course I do, as of now it's just a prison. I would do anything to get out now," I say.

"Would you…kill yourself?" she says with a straight face.

"What?" I ask dumbfounded.

What the hell is she talking about? Why did she get so serious just now? She avoids my question and starts speaking.

"You know, back in the real word. I would say something like what you just said about this one," she says, "this world as of now is just a prison. I would do anything to get out."

"Wait…are you saying…did you try to kill yourself back in the real world?" I ask scared.

"Several times."

I suddenly feel heavy and uncomfortable, I feel a huge knot in my throat. A feeling of dryness plagues my mouth and I just sit there silently.

"In here, I can walk, run, and jump whenever I want," she continues, "I have freedom I don't have in the real world."

"What are you talking about?" I say after clearing my throat, to no avail she keeps talking while ignoring my question.

"I don't exactly hate this world. Of course I fear I might die, but, I also fear I might have to go back to the real world."

I million thoughts go through my head, coming to think of it I know little about her in the real world. Likes and dislikes can only tell you so much about someone. As far as I know a significant aspect of her is that she owns dogs.

"You are not making any sense now…" I say in a low voice.

She ignores me again and keeps on rambling.

"Here...here I can do whatever I want whenever I want! I don't have restrictions or limitations. I'm someone entirely different from who I am in the real world," she says enthusiastically.

I try looking at something other than her for a second, but for some reason I just can't get my eyes off her serious expression.

"I'm afraid of having to go back to my damaged self…in the real world," she says as her voice tones down.

"Damaged?" I ask naively.

"Here I'm not pathetic. Here I can do anything," she says.

I finally snap and raise my voice.

"Can you get to the fucking point please?!" I say harshly.

She shows a scared face for a second and looks away quickly. I feel like slapping myself across the face for snapping like that.

"I can't move from the waist down back there," she murmurs.

I feel as if something takes the air away from me and it suddenly becomes hard to breathe. Watch your damned mouth. Idiot. Idiot. Idiot.

"Why tell me this…why tell me this now?" I grunt.

She gets up slowly with teary eyes and starts walking around in a little circle with her hands close to her chest.

"Just recently…I felt like I could really trust you," she mutters, "I feel like I could trust you with anything now."

I move around a little in my seat and place my hand on my neck as I feel the uncomfortable knot in my throat become tighter.

"How…how did it happen…?" I question.

She stops moving and stares right at her feet. I should just probably consider never speaking again to avoid these kind of moments.

"Do you…really want to know?" she replies with a drowned out voice.

In my stupidity and complete lack of empathy or respect I nod.

"A drunk driver crashed against us when my father and I were going back home from visiting some family. My father died and ended up bound to a chair… My sister was away with my mother that day…thankfully," she says slowly as she sits down on the bed again.

I can see her crying now and she starts sobbing after a few seconds.

"I…I didn't want you or…or Daath thinking lowly of me..or any-"

I find myself hugging Elina close as she starts to cry a little harder in my arms. I pat her back and wait for a few moments as she keeps letting everything out. In the midst of it I can't help but to feel my eyes water up a bit.

"I would never, think that way of you. You are a strong girl Elina. A very strong girl," I say gently next to her ear.

She buries her face in my chest and keeps crying for a little longer. She slowly stops and I can only hear her sob a little.

"Does Daath know?" I can't help to ask.

"No," she says.

I nod and stop hugging her. She does the same and steps back a little to sit on the edge of the bed.

"Can I…sleep here tonight?" she asks in a simple question, but her whole expression looks more like begging to me.

"Yes, you can," I say.

She nods and gets into bed.

"Good night, Al," she says with a smile.

I get on my feet and press my head against the frame of the window. I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. I've never been good in opening to people. I've always been cautious about how I relate to them too. I didn't know how to react to this. Was it bad that I cried? Will she hate me because I showed pity? I hope I reacted the way she was expecting me to. For a brief moment I look back at a sleeping Elina. I smile and turn to the window again. It seems I won't be sleeping again tonight. I sit on the chair and stretch a little.

"What a crazy day," I say to myself.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

Dark dark secrets people, Elina's character is an interesting one, I'll tell you that much.

If you are new to this story, and you liked what you just read please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Secrets"


	4. Chapter 4 - Secrets

**Chapter 4 - Secrets**

**November/29th/2022**

**Alshep**

"I thought you said this was going to be easy," I grunt as I steady my sword.

Daath steps back a little until he reaches the wall where I'm leaning on. He sighs and lifts his sword a little in-front of him.

"My bad, I guess," he says.

We stand surrounded by stone-like humanoids that just keep pressing against us. Out of potions and food to boost our health points, we find ourselves in a dire situation. I try to step back some more but the wall behind me feels all too solid. I get a stance going and hear the whirring of a sword skill getting ready.

"How's your HP?" Daath asks me as he gets a sword skill ready as well.

I glance quickly to the corner of my eye.

"A little past half…" I mutter

Daath sighs yet again and I just sulk. It's getting to dangerous levels and I really don't have anything to heal myself with.

"Ok, we can do this, it's just five of them against us," Daath says enthusiastically.

"Yeah, god forbid they were just two right?" I say sarcastically.

Daath chuckles and attacks right after doing so. I turn to our enemies and scream before running towards them. I connect with the first one successfully doing a three hit combo before backing up from him. The sword feels light and powerful in my hands. I duck just in time to have one arm of the stone-men swing over my head. I turn to it and dash towards it. Just before reaching it I jump and stand on its shoulders. Thankfully these things are slow and it just so let's me stab its head a couple of times before it bursts into light right at my feet. The enemy I attacked first swings at me and manages to hit me. He sends me flying to the wall and I crash against it in full force.

"Fuck," I gasp as I drop to the ground.

My hit points drop to critical and they flash in a hard to miss shade of red.

"Don't overdo it! Just leave it to me alright?!" Daath says as he takes down an enemy.

I chuckle and smirk at him.

"You underestimate me," I grunt while I stand up.

"Exactly the opposite man, you are too thickheaded. You act way too much on impulse!" He yells as he stops and attacks with his sword. "You are great at fighting, but you are impulsive. Back down for now!"

I chuckle a little more and get my sword ready.

"Just watch."

With that, I dash to the golem that hit me and slam against it with my side. The impact reduces my HP some more, but I successfully topple it to the ground. I jump on its chest and quickly drive my sword through its head. I pull it out and drive it once again successfully killing it this time. Quickly turning myself I manage to block the fist of the last golem standing with my sword. The impact pushes me backwards but doesn't decrease my health. In fit of rage I scream loudly and swing my sword at the stone man. After three hits and jump back and start a sword skill.

I jump high and grab my sword with both hands as I drop to push my sword on its head. I feel my feet hit the thing's face and I push my glowing sword through its face. It groans and quickly disappears. I get to the floor and get on my knees to get a breather.

"Well," I breathe in deeply and exhale loudly as Daath finishes off the last enemy, "that was easy."

Daath puts away his weapon and walks towards me with a smile on his face. He reaches for the inventory and tosses me a red vial. I catch it and look at Daath as he leans on the wall. I look back at my hand and then back to him. I do this a couple of times.

"Uhm, you should use that," he says.

"You are a fucking asshole, you know that?" I say while still trying to catch my breath.

"What? Why?"

"I thought you said you didn't have any more potions!" I yell.

He crosses his arms and lets out a mocking laugh. Seriously, I was about to die. What is wrong with this idiot?

"These things just dropped it," he says.

Yeah, right. I thank him and stand up to sheath my blade. In one big gulp I down the potion and see my health slowly starting to regenerate. We take a break and sit along the wall.

"I never thought the last five floors would be this hard," I complain while stretching my arms.

"Well that's just an assumption, this maze had twenty floors in the beta. I really don't know if that number stayed the same," Daath replies.

I bring up my menu and scroll aimlessly to see if I got any new item I haven't noticed. Ever since day one I haven't seen any reason as to why I should change swords constantly like all players do. Maybe it is because I have a rare sword that actually has a lot of power to it. Even Daath himself has been using that blade he got from Horunka Village. He has been upgrading it too, so there is no sense in changing it anytime soon.

Just yesterday I decided it was time to question Daath about upgrading. To my surprise it is easy. Very easy. In my mind I had it all thought up as a very complicated thing, but it turns out all you need most of the time is a lot of Col and a Blacksmith with sufficient skill to not screw up your weapon. Since I have no interest in Blacksmithing, I'll be leaving that to NPCs. I will not in ever let a player handle my upgrading.

"Wolf Blade plus five," I say to myself.

I close my inventory and rest my back on the wall while Daath keeps searching something on his inventory. Looking around the area I see a silhouette with a green cursor approaching us from the right. I push Daath a little and point to his right. He nods at me and closes his menu as I stand up. Daath stands too and crosses his arms. I just place one hand on the grip of my sheathed sword as the shadowy figure approaches. A black hooded woman walks towards us and stops just a few feet away. The hood covers her eyes and only the kind of pale smoothness of her nose and lips can be seen.

She doesn't say anything and neither do we. We just stand in the dim lighted corridor staring at each other.

"Are you looking for trouble?" she asks from afar.

"Not if you aren't as well," Daath replies confidently.

The woman smirks at us and reaches for the grip of her blade behind her back.

"And what if I am?" she continues.

I pull on my sword a little and unsheathe it a bit to be ready if this goes south. Daath keeps his cool and doesn't uncross his arms. He either is that much of a badass or he just didn't notice the woman reach for her sword.

"If you are, then you'll have to deal with us," Daath says.

The hooded girl takes out her sword quickly and places it in front of her, I do the same and step forwards a bit. She holds a slightly curved blade with a rather long grip. It looks more like a hybrid between a sword and a spear.

"A naginata war sword," Daath says in awe.

"You are complementing her? She is threatening us you idiot," I grunt.

"Indeed it is. Now, are you going to keep standing in my way?" she asks forcefully.

Make up your mind woman.

"What if you join us for a while?"

Confused I turn my head to Daath and see him smiling after asking his question. I look at the girl and her lips make a weird smile.

"What?" she asks confused.

"You heard me. Join us for a bit. We'll split our earnings when we decide to go separate ways. How about that?"

I put away my sword and slap Daath over his head.

"Are you mad?!" I shout in his ear, "she was just about to try to kill us."

Daath chuckles a bit.

"With that sword she wouldn't have just tried. She would've succeeded."

The girl sheathes her sword and slowly gets her hood out of her face. Smooth white skin and long slick black hair are revealed as she does this. Her green-ish eyes look straight at us. I won't lie, she is good looking.

"Hmph, fine, but if any of you two try anything funny you'll answer to me," she says.

I turn to Daath and grab him from his shoulders.

"What have you done idiot, she'll kill us when she gets the chance," I whisper.

He smiles but at the same time looks worried.

"Relax, maybe she'll help us clear some floors," he says awkwardly.

Daath pushes me away and opens his menu as the black haired girl approaches us. He opens the invites tab and sends her one. The girl abruptly stops as the screen pops up in-front of her.

"What's this?" she asks.

This is like Elina on the first day all over again. I can´t help but to laugh to myself and just watch as Daath explains that it is an invite to join our party. Dumbfounded she accepts the invite and her health bar appears before Daath's in heads up display. Her name reads "Aeri".

"You never been in a party?" I ask.

"No, not at all. I've gone solo since day one," she replies.

"Alright, Aeri," says Daath, "did you get up to here all by yourself?"

"She just did say she has been going solo…" I mumble.

She nods slowly and her face suddenly shows anger.

"What? Do you think I need help or something blondey?" she exclaims angrily.

Daath shakes his head and waves his hands like so in-front of him. To watch him act this nervously just makes me die inside. I guess he really is scared of that girl using her sword against us. After a good seven minutes of watching Daath act pathetically in front of a girl we keep going our original way through the maze. Aeri seems like a volatile person so I just keep my distance as she walks along with us.

"Up ahead, more golems," Aeri points out.

I ready my sword and walk past her quickly. I feel a hand on my shoulder and I'm pulled back violently.

"Sit down, leave this to me," she says.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" I huff.

She laughs and takes out her sword as she jumps over the golems. Daath follows and starts attacking the nearest enemy. I quickly recover myself and join battle. Daath and I are concentrating on individual enemies while Aeri quickly zips between the others, attacking them sporadically.

I can't help but to have a bad feeling about her. She is weird and aggressive. Not that I am not like that in a way. Her behavior is just too different from what I've encountered from other players in the last month. Getting my head back into combat I stab the golem in front of me and drive my sword up its chest doing a lot of damage. I pull the sword out and slice my foe diagonally. This kills it and I'm able to help out Daath as he tells me to switch to deliver the finishing blow.

Aeri seems to be having a blast as she hasn't stopped laughing while attacking the three enemies she is handling. She moves swiftly above and beneath them, the way she moves puts me and Daath to shame. She then stops right in the middle of the golems and her sword starts glowing. Every single one of the three golems lifts their fists in anger as they drop them down to attack.

Aeri lets out a final giggle and starts spinning with her sword extended towards the golems. We see her sword slash the three of them in an abnormally fast manner. Soon enough they burst almost at the same time and Aeri stands smiling and heaving as they disappear. She sheathes her sword and puts her hands on her knees as she takes a few deep breaths.

"Man, I don't know if that is attractive or really freaking scary," Daath mumbles in my direction.

"Dude, not even for a second. She is a freaking psycho," I reply.

She looks at us and smiles as she walks our way.

"You aren't like alright..." I raise my hand and poke my own head a couple of times, "up here, huh?

She gives me a stern look and gets uncomfortable close to my face. She stares right in to my soul for a couple of seconds and doesn't say a thing.

"Boo!" she shouts.

Sincerely not expecting that, my heart jump and I step back a little like a scared little girl. I hear Daath laughing loudly and Aeri flicks my forehead as she starts to laugh.

"Seriously, it's like I only get along with maniacs here," I mutter.

"Aw come on, can't take a joke?" she says teasingly as she gets behind me and catches up with Daath.

A little scared I turn myself around and start following from behind. Daath is chatting with Aeri as I open my messages to see if Elina sent anything. As I expected I find something in my inbox but it isn't from Elina. But from a red haired individual I met two days ago. I must've gotten this message before I went inside the dungeon.

From: Klaus  
To: Alshep  
Subject:-  
Message: Don't dare to think our problem is over. You don't mess with the White Snakes! You better watch your back boy. We'll be watching.

I chuckle a little but for some reason can't help but to look behind me quickly. I delete his message and send a quick one to Elina. I know it won't get to her until I leave the maze but it doesn't hurt to write it out right now.

From: Alshep  
To: Elina  
Subject: I'm surrounded by crazy people.  
Message: Hi, just checking up on you. How are things looking back in Tolbana?

I send just that and close my menu as I see a towering golem become visible in front of us.

"Does this qualify as a mid-level boss?" says Aeri with a rather creepy tone on her voice.

"It should, it's freaking massive," I say while taking out my sword.

"Well, only one way to find out, no?" says Daath.

Aeri giggles and jumps head first, just as she does this I notice a second giant golem around the corner where the first one was placed.

"Dammit, wait!" I shout.

She doesn't hear me and starts attacking the first one at full speed.

"Well, let's help this idiot out!" I yell at Daath.

He nods and we both run at the second golem that is approaching Aeri from behind. Aeri doesn't notice at all and she keeps fighting her first enemy. Daath jumps with a sword skill cooking and slices the mid chest area of the massive enemy.

"Switch!" he yells.

I slide in between its legs and slice them multiple times before coming out from behind him.

"Switch," I say.

Daath parries one of its punches barely escaping it and counter attacks with amazing speed and power. The damage output is high enough that it makes the golem stagger while Daath tells me to switch again. I ready my pierce skill as I jump trying to get near its neck or upper back. Only reaching above its hip I lunge my sword and it easily slides in. I feel it connect and twist it around to make some more damage. My attack stuns the enemy and I take the chance to switch with Daath. He jumps to the wall and kicks it hard making him go a little higher. His sword glows and he comes down with it slicing it vertically. Not paying much attention to its legs something pushes me forcefully against the wall.

Daath's attack doesn't destroy the golem and now it has me pinned against the wall. Its stone foot is chipping away at my armor and health. I try to move and push it away but I can't do anything. I manage to lift my arms along with my sword and start slashing the foot with a sword skill. I don't feel pain but the incredible amount of pressure is everything but comfortable. All of the sudden my upper armor blows up into pieces and me health starts decreasing faster.

"Do something. Daath!" I shout.

Without losing a second he unleashes a barrage of slicing skills all over the golem. I drop my sword and start pushing the foot away with my arms and legs. I move it a bit but it's still dropping my hit points. My HP reaches yellow and Daath is finally able to destroy the hulking mass of rocks.

I drop to my knees and reach for my sword. I stand quickly as Daath reaches me.

"Hell, it destroyed your chest plate," he exclaims.

"Yeah, no shit," I reply, "quickly we got to help this girl out before she gets herself kill-"

I stop myself as I see Aeri take down the giant golem on her side. She jumps back and puts away her sword while smiling. Watching this girl is becoming really unnerving to me.

"Hey where's the result screen?" she complains.

I hear a loud thud behind me and turn to see a red golem with a purple cursor over its head. You've got to be shitting me. With little health and incomplete armor I stand back with my sword at the ready. Daath does the same and we slowly walk backwards to where Aeri is standing.

"This is becoming a rather inconvenient cliché," Daath mutters to himself.

Aeri walks past us and gives her back to the red golem.

"Well, this is where we cut ties," she says while she waves at us with her right hand, "Ciao!" she says mockingly.

The golem attacks her but she quickly dodges to the side and slides under its legs as she starts making a run for it.

"That bitch…" I say.

"We can take him on don't wo-"

"Oh screw you, this is all your fault!" I interrupt.

Daath sighs and attacks promptly with two sword skills. He yells "switch" and I step in piercing one of its legs and then slashing it a little.

"Let's have her joins us for a bit! She'll help us clear some floors!" I mock angrily.

Daath switches back in jumps to stab the golem in the chest, this makes it stagger and wobble on its feet a bit.

"Switch me back in!" I say.

"Alright, switch!"

I quickly get behind it and ready the piercing skill again. I charge towards its wobbly feet and push my sword through the back of one leaning along with it. What I had in mind works and I manage to get one of its feet off the ground.

"Hit him in the chest again! Knock him down! Switch!" I yell.

Daath takes a few steps back and runs towards the golem. Just before reaching him he jumps and hits the red monster with the blunt side of his blade making it fall right over my head. I roll just in the right time to clear its fall. The red golem struggles helplessly on the ground and we continue to attack it relentlessly. We drop its health to half and the thing suddenly starts glowing.

"What the hell?" I say.

"Shit, get back! Now!" Daath shouts.

I turn around and start running away but something lifts me of the ground and sends me flying deeper into the corridor. I hit the ground and I try to roll on my side to recover. I quick glance and I see my hit point reached the red beeping critical level again. My shoulder plates burst into light and I reach for my sword. I try to get on my feet but something pushing me down stops me.

"Don't worry, we got this," says a voice patting my shoulder.

I turn my head slightly and see a blue haired man standing beside me along with five other men.

"Attack!" He commands and along with his men he rushes the red golem. Daath steps back letting them through and runs to me. He helps me stand and gets me leaning against a wall.

"You are one lucky bastard Al," he says while patting my back.

"Losing two pieces of armor and almost dying isn't what I would call lucky," I say jokingly.

The group assisting us quickly dispatches of the golem and the results pop in-front of us giving me and Daath a large portion of exp and Col. Bigger numbers is always better I guess. I lean on my back and slide down to sit on the floor. I turn to the group of players as the blue haired man approaches me and Daath.

"Were you taking that thing on just by yourselves?" he asks.

"Yeah, we are just that cool," I say.

Daath nods and gives me his hand so I can get back on my feet.

"All joking aside, thanks for the help," I say while stretching my hand out to the man.

"No worries, my name is Diabel and this is my party."

He shakes my hand and his party waves accordingly.

"Well thank you, Diabel," I say.

Daath shakes his hand as well and thanks him.

"Oh, I remember that guy!" says a tall bald man behind Diabel, "he is the one that socked that White Snakes guy in Tolbana the other day."

I chuckle and wave at the guy as the other guys start muttering stuff to each other.

"I heard of that," says Diabel. "Quite a show that night. Anyways, what are you two doing here alone?"

"We were just trying to see what was up here," Daath replies.

Diabel nods and thinks for a second.

"You should be a little more careful, your partner almost died just now," he says as if scolding Daath.

Daath only nods and stands there awkwardly.

"Wait, I think I know you," claims Daath.

Diabel suddenly looks nervous and interrupts Daath.

"You must be mistaking me for someone else, I'm good with faces. I'm sure I wouldn't forget someone like yourself," he says nervously.

His party doesn't seem to notice but Diabel seems extremely nervous and his face almost shows anxiety. Daath stops pushing the matter and turns away from Diabel.

"You are right, I must have mistaken you for someone else," he mutters. "Thanks for the help, my partner and I will be going now."

I turn away as well and start walking the way we were coming from earlier.

"What was that all about?" I question.

"That guy…I'm pretty sure I saw him during the beta testing period."

The way Diabel acted finally made sense in my head. Since almost a week ago, an unusual hate against beta tester has been rising. Other players blame them for the deaths of beginners during the first weeks.

Without proof or consent some players even started tracking beta testers to "make them pay". That didn't mean anything necessarily bad until just a few days ago we heard those words now sometimes involve PK-ing.

"Do you think that his party didn't know about it?"

Daath nods and appears thoughtful.

"Yeah, there's no other reason for his behavior."

I agree with him and we keep making our way out of the maze in silence.

* * *

As we step outside I remember about the message I sent Elina. I go over my menu and open the message in my inbox with her name.

From: Elina  
To: Alshep  
Subject: Reply  
Message: Sorry for the late reply. Things are ok in town. Although I can't help but to feel this…sort of tension building up. I'll be waiting for you guys at the inn. I met someone I think you should meet.

I sigh loudly and close my menu quickly. Daath notices and turns his head to me.

"What is it?" he asks.

"Apparently Elina has someone she wants us to meet," I sigh.

"Why that reaction?"

"I don't want to meet new people for a while," I add.

He nods and chuckles a bit.

"Yeah that girl almost screwed us over back there, huh?" he says.

I give him a faint look and turn my eyes to the road.

"Fine, fine I'll shut up then," he groans.

We reach Tolbana rather quickly and on the first shop I see I buy five health potions. I take one out and use it as soon as it comes out of my inventory. My health slowly fills up and I let out a shout of joy.

"Well that was freaking close," I say to myself as I turn to Daath, "Hey! How come you almost never get hit?!"

"Because I'm good at dodging and you suck at it," he says while giving me a big smirk.

With no comeback ready and shut my trap and shove him playfully as we keep walking. Before reaching the inn I stop at another shop and buy a new chest plate along with some crimson shoulder plates. They have better stats than the ones I had before so they should do just nicely.

"By the way I don't mean to pry into your personal stuff but I do feel the need to ask something."

"Shoot," I reply.

He clears his throat before continuing and puts his hand over my shoulder. I take out another health potion and start drinking it since the last didn't heal me completely.

"Have you been sleeping with Elina?"

I stop on my feet and spit out what I was drinking of the potion. I look at him with my jaw open and one eye brow slightly higher than the other.

"What?"

"Well I know she's been going into your room lately. Sometimes she doesn't come out until morning," he continues.

"So now you are stalking us? I mean me?" I say, "It's not what you think, we just talk. It helps her fall asleep."

"And then you sleep together, huh?" he mocks, "All lovey dovey, nice and close?"

"It's not like that, she sleeps on my bed and I just doze off on the chair," I say raising my voice.

"Right, the chair," he adds. "Is that before or after you two share intimate warmth?"

I sigh and push him off me.

"It's not what you think dammit. She is like a cousin or a little sister, I don't see her the way you are thinking," I clarify.

I say that, but I don't think I would treat a relative the way I treat Elina. He laughs a bit and punches my arm playfully.

"I know, I know. I'm just yanking your chain here."

"Haha, you are hilarious," I say monotonously.

I relax internally as he drops the subject. He mentioning her late night visits made me remember what I discussed with her two days ago. Daath doesn't know about Elina's state in real life. Not that I would tell him without permission, but the sudden appearance of the topic makes me feel somewhat mellow.

"You ready to meet this person?" Daath asks as we approach the inn.

I shake my head and move my hands sideways, but ultimately sigh as we enter the inn.

"Al! Daath!" says a familiar voice.

Elina runs towards me and Daath and stops before reaching us.

"I'm so glad you two are ok!" she says while smiling.

I smile at her and pat her head slightly.

"So, who do you want us to meet?" Daath asks.

"Oh, right! She is just over here," she says as she pulls us through the inn.

"She?" I ask.

Elina pulls me and Daath around some tables and we finally reach the one where we normally eat at. Sitting down on it is a woman all dressed in black with an awfully familiar face.

"Her name is Aeri, I met her outside town while I was hunting a bit ago," Elina says with a smile.

She looks at us and drops the bread she was about to take a bite out of. Her face is priceless but I'm not exactly in the mood to enjoy it. I feel Daath's hand over my shoulder again as he pats it a bit.

"Well, you can't really say you are meeting someone new after all," he says while trying to hold back his laugh.

"Seriously, you should be a freaking comedian." I reply.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

Aeri is another of the main characters in this story, and I like to thin she is one of the most pivotal in all the length of the story.

Same as before, if you like what you read please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Looking Into Things"


	5. Chapter 5 - Looking Into Things

**Chapter 5.- Looking Into Things**

**November/29th/2022 - (Late-night)**

**Daath**

"Why did you bring her here Elina?!" Al asks outraged.

The poor girl stands in front of him looking at the ground as she mutters the word "Sorry" again and again. Aeri seems to have frozen on spot as she hasn't moved and her mouth is still wide open. I can't help but to feel the urge to laugh, but for the sake of not pissing off the big man I sit down and open my menu to send a quick message to an acquaintance of mine. Quickly doing what I had in mind I close my menu and lean on the table with my arms.

Al growls something even I can't decipher and sits beside me. Elina still looking apologetic sits on the other end of the table next to Aeri. Aeri seems to be quite shocked still so I just sit there awkwardly waiting for Al to break the ice in his usual eloquent manner.

"What the hell are you doing here in the first place?"

Here we go. I calmly lean more on my arms and watch the conversation ensue.

"Wh-what do you mean?" Aeri responds.

"You know exactly what I mean! You left us to die back in the maze, and now you think you can just show up here?" Al answers.

Well she did not know Elina's connection to us, but as always Al is just jumping places where there aren't even conclusions. I keep that thought to myself and keep watching.

"I met her outside town, she was having trouble so I helped her out," the black haired girl mutters.

"Is that true Elina?" I interrupt.

Elina nods shyly and keeps hiding her face from Al. I grin at her and Al keeps talking.

"So does that take out the fact you tried to monster PK us?"

Elina suddenly looks up and stares at Aeri. She appears disappointed and Aeri just tries to not look at her.

"Is that true?" Elina says.

Aeri does her best to not look at anyone and I decide it's about time for me to speak up for a second time.

"Well that isn't entirely true."

I feel Al's eyes already pinned on me and try not to mind the feeling too much for the sake of explaining my point.

"We encountered a purple cursor monster, Al and I didn't have any means to leave the dungeon. So Aeri took her chance and decided it was not worth it to stay and fight," I explain.

Elina nods and rubs her chin a little as she tries to make sense of it. Al backs off and trains his sight back on Aeri. On the other hand Aeri sits in-front of me with a smile.

"Yeah that exactly what happe-" she stops.

Her smile disappears and her teeth show, appropriately resembling what I can just describe as an angry beast.

"Are you calling me a coward?!" she yells as she slams the table.

"You did bail out on us," I say.

She stares at me in rage and then sits down calming herself down a little. While Al's point of monster PK-ing did hold ground, it didn't seem logical to keep badgering the girl. Nevertheless, that's just my reasoning. After all she did act a little psychotic when we were together. So my guess might be as good as Al's.

"Just say it already! You did expect us to die in there!" Al yells.

Aeri looks away yet again as if she was hiding something and purses her lips. She has something stored inside but she is afraid or ashamed to say it. Elina clearly notices this and places her hand on Aeri's shoulder.

"Come on, you can say it," she mutters.

Aeri looks at Elina and then to me and Al. She opens her mouth but closes it quickly again as she stares at the table.

"I…I was afraid of dying myself…or that one of you actually had died," she mumbles.

I feel joy at the sudden comment and elbow Al a little so he at the very least eases up a little on the girl.

"Bullshit…" Al groans.

"It's true…" Aeri mutters to herself.

"Come on give her a break," I comment, "truth or not she appears remorseful. Cut her some slack will ya?"

He frowns, but thankfully stands down. I get up quickly and go buy some food from the inn keeper. I get a jug of water and four sandwiches. Quickly I return to the table and lay out the food on it. Elina starts eating rather quickly and Al takes a bite out of his food like a child who was just ordered to finish up what's on his plate.

"Is this one…for me?" Aeri asks me.

I nod as I fill my cup with water. Her eyes practically shine and she starts eating her sandwich in a rather fast manner. She suddenly stops and hides her face.

"Thank you." she mumbles with a mouthful.

"What?" I tease.

"Thank you," she mumbles again.

"I can't hear you."

"I said thank you!" she says raising her voice.

Surprisingly enough we all finish our meal in silence and sit quietly for a while. Nothing had to be said and my best guess was that we were all finally on the same page.

"Let's start with the right foot this time," I say, getting everyone's attention, "my name is Daath, big man's Alshep and the girl sitting beside you, Elina."

Aeri nods quietly and places her arms on the table.

"You guys, don't use your real names? But...you seem to be close," she says.

"We never got around to knowing each other's real names. And we agreed not to use them a few days after we met," says Al.

Elina nods and takes a sip of water.

"It's all we see in the heads up display anyways," he adds.

"Are you guys a guild or something?" Aeri questions.

"Guilds can't be created until we reach other floors," I claim. "You have to clear quest on top of that."

"Huh? What about that White Snakes guy?" Al asks.

Guild management doesn't become available until further floors. So Klaus might as well just been in a party with his little minions that day. Kind of odd to come with a name and outfits for it though.

"He must've been in a party with the guys he was with," I clarify.

"But they had outfits and a guild name and stuff," says Elina.

"Merely clothes and a name, not necessarily a guild," I explain.

An eerie silence plagues the table and I find myself with nothing else to add to the conversation that was going rather fluidly seconds ago. Aeri suddenly stand up and exits the table.

"Well…thanks for the meal. I guess this is where I say goodbye," she says in a mellow tone.

I can see Al nodding to himself smiling, as if he had just won something. A quick glance towards Elina reveals to me a motive that is bound to piss off the hell out of Al.

"Why don't you stay with us?" says Elina.

As suspected Al's victory smile disappears in less than a second and I can already see him scolding Elina loudly in my mind.

"What?" Aeri says just as she is about to leave.

Watching as Al is just ready to explode I decide it would be a good idea to back up Elina on this.

"Yeah, why don't you stay? You could join our party. Until you see fit or just indefinitely."

I feel Al's about to burst rage focusing on me as I do my very best to ignore the feeling. Aeri turns around and gets herself back in her seat on the table.

"Really? Are you ok with that?" she asks cautiously.

I nod and see Al is about to open his mouth. Probably regretting my next move I slide over to him and cover his mouth with my hand.

"I don't think we have any objections. Although, you will have to learn to not leave anyone behind," I comment.

She smiles slightly and breathes in deeply.

"Thank you so much guys," she replies.

Seeing that sudden change of attitude "again" makes me believe she is not that bad of a person. The easy going smile and her attitude makes up for an interesting person. Only time will tell, although I do see Al and her bumping down the road frequently.

Elina sends her a party invite and I add her since we disbanded the party for when Al and I went to the maze. In the corner of my eye I know see four names along with health bars.

"Daath"  
"Alshep"  
"Elina"  
"Aeri"

"You better make it up to us for leaving us in the maze though," Al orders.

Here we go.

"Hey! Seriously! It was never my intention to leave you to die there. I was scared myself, I just did what you would've done if you were alone as well," she says.

Al should at the very least admit he agrees with her on that but knowing him that won't happen anytime soon.

"Oh yeah sure, I would've totally bailed on the people that were helping me!" Al growls.

Aeri shows her teeth again in that creepy yet somewhat funny animalistic way and slams the table.

"If anything I was the one helping you guys out!" she shouts.

It would seem every time we sit down at this table to talk all we do only attracts attention and since this time it isn't any different I start noticing how players around literally stop what they were doing to catch a glimpse of the on-going discussion.

Al and Aeri exchange shout after shout and it gets to the point where the conversation stops making sense. Elina and I sit in the middle of it trying to make some sense out of what they are arguing about.

"I bet I have a faster reaction time than you fatty!" she yells.

"You surely do, but you have nothing against my defense," Al admits trying to change the course of conversation.

"STOP!" Elina yells suddenly.

Both Al and Aeri look at Elina just after she yelled with all her might. They look back at each other and then back to Elina.

"Can't we have a nice evening for once? I know you are new to this table Aeri, but Al for god's sake. Please just one night, that's all I ask for," she says with a firm voice.

Impressed I can't help but to smile at the girl. Aeri sits down immediately and so does Al. I chuckle a bit and have another sip from my cup of water. Like grounded children Al and Aeri don't look at each other or at Elina. Elina finally sits down and I can see faint sign of fulfillment on her expression.

Suddenly through the chatter of other players in the inn I hear someone whistling in a tone I have been expecting ever since I sent my last message. I turn my head slightly to the door trying to not raise too much attention, and see a hooded player. She looks at me and beckons me over before disappearing in the darkness that lies beyond the door.

"If you'll excuse me," I say while standing up.

I leave my table behind and quickly step outside to see the hooded figure step into an alley not far from the inn. I make my way there swiftly and into the alley. In front of me now stands the girl in hood I was looking for.

"How's it going whiskers?" I say.

"It's Argo to you, Daath."

"Wow, wow, I thought you were all business what is it with the name calling now?"

She grins at me and extend her hand towards me.

"Bird won't sing if she's got nothing to eat."

I transfer five hundred Col over to her and cross my arms.

"That's not the amount we agreed on," she grunts.

"Well, it turns out I might not want to hear all of the bird's song." I mock.

She hisses at me and leans against the wall. I obviously pissed her off, but I'm not entirely trusting of her and I want my information before anything else goes out of my pocket.

"This Diabel guy you asked for, he is in Starting City right now," she explains.

"And?"

"And you have to pay for the rest of your information," she mocks.

A little pissed I give her another five hundred Col. She gets off the wall and gets closer to me as she continues talking.

"He has been going around shops purchasing stuff since he left the maze a bit ago," she mutters.

How she gets this information just baffles me, but I got nothing else than to believe what she says to be the truth.

"What does that have to do with anything?" I ask.

The girl with whiskers turns to me with a smirk and extends her hand towards me again.

"You are unbelievable…" I complain while transferring her some more Col.

Receiving more than the accorded payment she giggles and gets closer to me.

"Well, he could be nervous, but there's no reason to act that way. Maybe he is just buying stuff like anyone would," she says.

"Well that didn't help me whatsoever," I say.

"Hey, hey, you know I don't give refunds," she says quickly.

"Yeah, I know you are a rat alright."

She laughs some more and walks away from me a bit.

"Hence the title...and the whiskers I guess...either way," she says, "if you don't mind me asking…why do you need this info? Why only from this player?"

"I thought you only talked business," I mutter.

"You are scary Daath," she admits. "You don't plan on PK-ing him are you? Back in the beta you-"

"What I do with this information is none of your business."

She huffs and turns her back on me as she begins to walk away.

"Information is my business," she says before disappearing into the alley.

I find myself standing alone in a dark alley all of the sudden. The information Argo gave me while short and ambiguous serves its purpose. I now know where Diabel is and plan to confront him. All because of that little itch I left unscratched back at the maze. I know it in my gut he is a beta tester, and if I'm right, he isn't exactly of the nice kind.

Swiping my hand I open my menu and send a message to Al.

From: Daath  
To: Alshep  
Subject: Don't wait up.  
Message: I have to go to Starting City, don't stay up waiting for me.

I close my menu and start heading out of Tolbana at brisk pace. The road I now travel was dangerous a few weeks ago, but its dangers now appear weak and pathetic after almost a month of leveling. On my way I meet with a couple unfortunate packs of wolves which I dispatch quickly and without taking damage. About halfway to Starting City Al decides to reply to my message.

From: Alshep  
To: Daath  
Subject: Reply  
Message: Not like I would, take care though.

I chuckle a bit and keep heading towards my target. After a few minutes of sprinting I find myself without breath at the very gates of Starting City. Running in this game has proven more exhausting than I ever began to imagine. As it turns out, I'm a lucky guy and find the blue haired individual I was looking for as he was making his way out of town.

"Diabel."

He notices me and walks over to me calmly.

"Daath, right?" he asks.

I nod as I recover from my feat of athleticism.

"What are you doing here? Where you looking for me?"

"You lied to me back in the maze," I say.

His eyes suddenly show panic and he takes a few steps back. I take a few towards him in case he tries to run for it.

"How the hell did you find me?"

The nervousness turns to anger.

"You went by another name during the beta, I'm sure of it. Your avatar is identical to the one I remember," I continue, "Isn't that right, Lucius?"

His eyebrows dip into his eyes as he reaches for his sword. I quickly do so too and just hold the grip as he hasn't taken out his word yet.

"Let's not make a scene here, I just want to ask a few questions," I say.

"You really got some nerve to track me down like this, but you caught my attention. I'll give you that much," he answers.

I'll take that as a yes then.

"Why are you all of the sudden hanging out with players and not killing them?"

He chuckles and moves his hand away from his sword.

"Haven't you heard? Killing here is now actual murder," he says mockingly.

"So you are just taking advantage out of your party?"

He laughs a little and nods.

"They do the dirty work and I sweep in as the mighty knight to get all the bonuses," he admits

I move my hand away from my sword and relax my stance a little. It all makes sense now. He is just taking advantage out of having people with him to attack monsters and always go in for the last strike. Given how high up in the maze he found us and can surely assume he's been doing it since the first floor. Having big numbers reduces his probabilities of losing much health and actually puts people in the line while acts as the leader.

It somehow makes me sick and I would give anything to just punch him right now, but I need to watch my temper.

"You are disgusting," I say.

He smirks widely at me and starts walking closer as if he didn't even care anymore.

"And what are you gonna do?" he mocks, "Kill me?"

I smile to myself a little as he walks past me. He notices this and turns towards me.

"You would? Wow, you are fucked up in the head man," he mumbles.

He keeps walking outside the gates and I turn just to see him about to disappear into the night.

"Does the name Datell ring any bells?" I say while I feel a big smile creep up my face.

Diabel stops suddenly and slowly turns my way with widened eyes.

"No way…you are th-"

"That's right, I'm the player killer killer," I interrupt.

His face flusters with panic and he stares at me frightened.

"You do remember, huh?" I ask.

"You crazy bastard. Are you still doing that?"

I shake my head and cross my arms.

"No one has given me any incentive to do so," I chuckle, "You wouldn't want to be the first, now would you?"

"You wouldn't do it again. You know what's at stake now!" he yells nervously.

"Then don't try me. If I hear you return to PK-ing. I'll find you and when I do. I won't be so civil with you."

He is angry, nervous and afraid. I can see it in his eyes. He is just looking for the right chance to run away. Killing player killers was seen as an extreme way of revenge back in the beta, but it would be treated as being a murderous vigilante now. I've been trying to avoid it this far.

But if it comes down to it again, I won't hesitate to allow people that are committing actual murder to go by just like that. If I have a chance to stop it, I won't just let it slide.

"Consider this a warning, Diabel," I say with a firm voice.

Finally taking a chance he starts running on the dark road to Tolbana. I uncross my arms as I relax a little and look around. The city's entrance is desolated and I can see the light further into the city shining brightly. I can't help but to feel the city is just filled with sadness and regret.

A lot of players haven't even moved outside of Starting City out of the fear of dying. This is understandable but, to give up in life just like that. It's quite saddening. This is supposed to be a place of joy and excitement. A game where you can be that person you would never get the chance to be in real life, but things took a turn to the morbid and now it finds itself turned into a horrifying game of death.

It's almost past midnight when I notice and I sigh to myself as I take in the city's gloomy vibe.

"People do change, huh?" says a voice behind me.

"Argo, for some reason I felt as if you followed me. Guess I was right," I mutter.

I turn around and see her face, I notice a faint smile and can't help but to return it.

"For a moment I thought you were going to kill him," she says.

"I wanted to, even if he says he hasn't killed anyone. Player killers right now…are criminal scum."

"You do notice the irony and hypocrisy in your sentence right?" she says, getting a little closer to me, "If you kill player killers now you would be becoming a real killer yourself. Kind of defeats the purpose don't you think?"

She is right and I know it's hypocritical and somewhat flawed to a point, but it's hard for me to overlook stuff like this. Even more so now.

"I know…" I reply, "You know me Argo, if it comes to it…I won't just stand there."

I feel her hand over my shoulder as she places herself next to me.

"For the sake of your sanity, I hope it doesn't get to that," she whispers. "Actually killing someone will haunt you, even if you think it was a good thing."

She pulls her hand away from me and starts walking away.

"Take care," she says before leaving without a trace in her usual manner.

Getting slapped by reality is hard, even harder when you are not in reality. I find myself a bench and sit to think things over thoroughly. The name I used to go by, Datell. The player killer killer…I sit and take in all the comments Argo made to me. She is right, more than I want to admit. I have no plan of becoming a vigilante of any sort, Datell will definitely never come back, but, with PK becoming a rising problem it is hard to be just a bystander.

After literally talking to myself for a while, I come to a conclusion. Daath will not be a player killer, nor a player killer killer. In a lame attempt to feel better with myself, I make a silent vow of protecting my friends and my friends alone. Suddenly the things I said to scare Diabel sounded empty and for some reason stupid. Argo should consider a career in life counseling other than an informant.

A beep gets my attention, I've got mail.

From: Alshep  
To: Daath  
Subject:-  
Message: What are you doing anyways?

From: Daath  
To: Alshep  
Subject: Reply  
Message: Just window shopping.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

Daath is yet another character I hold in high regard throughout my story. It might be a bit cliche the way I try to make him interesting, but I definitely think it pays out.

As always, if you like what you read please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Clearing"


	6. Chapter 6 - Clearing

**Author's Note:** A quick heads up. According to the light novel "Aria in The Starless Night" and SAO's Wiki, two meetings before the fight against the boss of the first floor are held. The second one being the one were strategies and parties are discussed, this one is held on December the 3rd. Subsequently the first raid is done on the 4th. According to the Anime this meeting is held in December the 2nd and the raid is done on the 3rd. I wrote this chapter over the chronology of the light novel not necessarily in the same context as the light novels though, just keep that in mind. Furthermore enjoy the sixth chapter of "Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds".

* * *

**Chapter 6.- Clearing**

**December/3rd/2022**

**Alshep**

Yesterday Daath informed me and Aeri that a meeting was held regarding the soon to be discovered boss of the first floor. Later he explained there was going to be a second meeting today and that we should consider going. He asked us not to let Elina know anything about it since she didn't want her near any high level enemies just yet. That made enough sense to me so I didn't bother in commenting about it.

Daath also explained he wouldn't be attending today's meeting because of some "unfinished business" he had a little out of Tolbana. Since nothing else really popped up during the early morning I decided to attend the meeting. Tragically I had a not so wanted companion going to it with me.

"Remind me again," I sigh, "Why the hell are we, you and I of all people, going to this together?"

"Hey, Daath told me about this as well. I have every right to go," Aeri replies, "besides, if you just didn't look this way with that disgusting face of yours you wouldn't even notice I'm here."

Keeping my eyes concentrated on the road ahead of me I breathe out slowly as I hang my head a little. The background music has been driving me crazy for the last month, but Aeri was able to swoop in and take first place in the list of things I can't stand.

"If you care to notice, I'm not even looking at you," I say growing little frustrated.

"In that…you might be right, but my point still stands," she says as if she didn't finish her sentence, "…sorta."

"You aren't very smart, are you?" I say.

I hear some fast footsteps and the girl in black hood places herself in-front of me. Almost growling at me, she says nothing for a bit and keeps walking backwards so she can face me.

"Didn't come up with a comeback before doing this?" I mock.

"Sh-shut up! I did I just see no reason to waste such awesome words in someone like you," she says nervously.

"So you didn't?"

"Grrr…you suck," she groans as she turns her back on me.

Confused I keep walking in a straight line to what I assume is the place the meeting is going to be held in. Approaching what I can only describe as a weird amphitheater. As anyone with any common knowledge would know, these things are designed downwards making the steps towards the center stage the seats for people attending the amphitheater. I've only known Aeri for a few days now, but that's all it takes to figure out if someone is bright or not. Aeri…let's just say she is a few keys short of a piano. Either that or she is straight out walking with her eyes closed.

I manage to reach out and grab her hood as she is about to step where she isn't looking and pull her before she has the chance of go rolling down the steps.

"Why are you touching me?" she says right away.

"Fine," I say as I let go.

She steps forwards and her foot quickly notices there's no more floor in front of her. She jerks her body in a hilarious manner and falls into the first landing of the amphitheater. She falls on her butt and quickly tries to get up to avoid any further embarrassment.

"Why didn't you tell me there was a step in-front of me?" she yells.

Quietly strangling her in my mind I jump down the first landing and sit down on the second one. It doesn't take long for her to join me. She sits down next to me making sure she shoves me while doing so. It would seem we arrived just in time. Several other players arrive with us and sit down around the steps. Suddenly a somewhat familiar voice cuts through the chatter of other players.

"O-K then, we are already late. We should get this thing started," says a blue haired man as he jumps down the steps and heads towards the center stage.

Taking a long clear look at the man I notice he is Diabel. The same man that pretty much saved my ass a few days ago back in the maze.

"Hmph, what is this guy doing?" Aeri mutters.

"Everyone please move a little bit closer, my voice isn't that loud," he adds.

"Come on," I say to Aeri while standing up.

We reallocate a little closer to the stage and sit near the last landing. Other players do the same and some sit near me and Aeri. A rather weird looking fellow sits next to her and I notice how she scoots a little closer to me.

"Hah, did I suddenly become likable?" I whisper.

She doesn't turn to me or anything she just "Hmph"s me in her usual manner and ignores me. That little cute noise she makes is the only redeemable quality about her. I really do not intend to sound like an ass, but she just gets under my skin.

"The ones that were here yesterday already know who I am," said Diabel, "for the very few who don't, I am Diabel and I'm a knight!"

People around start laughing a bit, but quiet down quickly. It felt as if he had just told some kind of inside joke everyone but Aeri and I knew.

"Yesterday's meeting didn't go as I expected but I hope this one doesn't require any huge pauses," he explains, "I hope everyone by now has purchased a copy of this."

As he finishes his sentence he takes out a small book and holds it in the air. Almost everyone around me takes the same thing out and starts flipping through its rather thin content, including Aeri.

"What in the world is that?" I ask.

"It's some sort of strategy guide. It was being sold for zero Col," she replies.

"It was given away then, not sold," I mock, "Anyways, when the hell did you get it?"

"I got it before we started heading here. Funny thing though, I didn't think I was actually going to use it here," she says laughing a little.

Looking around I notice everyone is digging into their book thingies and I am left alone with nothing in my hands. I lean back as I place my hands behind me and wait for a little bit. Aeri turns her head towards me and sighs.

"Fine…read it with me. Just try not to get too close," she says.

"Am I like a sort of repulsive thing to you or what?" I can't help to ask.

She nods slightly.

Well screw you too.

She then moves her head a little so I can read the book as well. Just as she said it is a literal strategy guide. It depicts the stats and information of the boss of the first floor. Its name, "Illfang the Kobold Lord". A huge red beast with a face that resembled an angry dog is shown in the small book. Alongside it is information about it.

Its health which rounds up to four full health bars, its weapon which is a sword of the scimitar type labeled the "Talwar", and even its sword skills. It is incredibly detailed, so much it makes me doubt how much of it is true.

"How did someone even make this?" I say.

"Beats me," Aeri mutters.

I keep reading the information as Aeri goes through it. Apparently this boss won't fight alone, a set group of minions named "Ruin Kobold Sentinels" are to pop out and help the boss as it is engaging players. A total of twelve of the things are to get in our way if we want to attack this enemy. Taking another look as Aeri flips through it I notice a part marked with bright red text.

-This information is from the time of the SAO beta test. It is possible that the current version may be different.-

So beta testers did this, huh? I can't really say I have an opinion on beta testers, given I only know the one. Everyone labels them as bad persons, but Daath is the complete opposite. While sometimes cold and silent he has been the biggest help Elina and I could ever ask for since the game started. I lift my head up and notice that everyone is still reading except for Diabel who seems to be breathing in deeply. He opens his eyes and breathes in a little more before he starts talking.

"Alright everyone, let's be thankful for this information," he says, "Regardless of the source, this is bound to help a lot in the coming battle. As of right now, it has completely eliminated the necessity of scouting battles."

Regardless of the source? Would they complain just because this might have been made by beta testers? People's hatred sure goes a long way.

"The source being…the beta testers?" Aeri asks tilting her head to me.

"Oh, so you do know how to read," I mock, "kidding aside, yes. This was probably made by them after all it says so right there."

I stop myself before talking more than I should. Aeri doesn't know Daath is a beta tester and he asked me and Elina to keep it that way since he would rather avoid any unnecessary attention. She nods her head acknowledging me and turns to Diabel as he continues speaking.

"If we take this information to be true, the boss's stats aren't really much to worry about. If this were any other game people level four or five should be able to attempt this battle successfully."

I look up to the left corner of my eye and see my level which stands at nine. Well it seems I'm more than fit for this thing. I smile to myself and keep listening to what the self-proclaimed knight has to say.

"With some well thought out tactics and enough potions I believe we can defeat this boss with little to no deaths," he says, "No, scratch that! We can do it with no deaths whatsoever. That's a promise! A knight's promise!"

Just finishing his sentence people all around start to cheer, Aeri starts to clap and people follow her as the whole place turns into a big buzz.

"This is rather fast, but I think it's time we start coming up with some kind of tactic. We are going to make a raid party!" he yells, "So please, make a party with friends and people near you."

"What?" Aeri blurts out.

The creepy man beside her scoots close and almost literally leans over Aeri.

"Wanna make a party with me?" he says in an ironically creepy as hell tone.

I see Aeri's face of disgust staring right at me as her face flushes a little. With a weird squirm like sound Aeri bolts up on her feet and runs towards a group of people close to last landing. I stand up and pat my legs a little.

"Don't take it personally," I say to the guy before following Aeri.

Jumping to the last landing I reach Aeri who is near a group of four people.

"It is a relief to know I'm not that disgusting to the point I scare you off," I say.

"You still are rather ugly, don't compliment yourself," she replies.

"Hey, you two. Come and join us. We are exactly two people short," says a tall bulky black man.

Aeri and I both walk over to him and receive an invite to the party, from a man named "Agil". We join a small circle of now six people.

"So what can you guys do?" asks the tall man who I assume to be Agil.

"I can take some damage if necessary, my sword has pretty good stats, so I guess I'm good on the offensive side as well," I say while knocking my shoulder plates.

"Ah, I see. What about you?" he asks Aeri.

"Huh? Me?" she says while pointing at herself.

The tall man nods and Aeri looks away while letting out that "Hmph" of hers.

"I'm the fastest player you'll ever see. I move like the wind, nothing can touch me," she says proudly.

"Aren't you exaggerating just a bit?" I mumble.

She slaps me over the head and puffs out her chest.

"You better believe it."

The tall guy nods with a somewhat weird frown and turns to the group in general.

"My name is Agil, I hope we can work well together," he says.

We all greet and exchange names in an awkward manner before Diabel reaches us.

"We'll be forming parties from the letter A to when we run out of people, haha," he says.

Diabel starts examining the party of six in front of him as he starts asking what we can do. Everyone in my entire group says they have a decent damage output and defense overall except for Aeri who keeps bragging about her speed.

"I think this group is well set up to be the second tank team. That being group B, although I would like you, Aeri in one of the assault teams," Diabel says.

Aeri nods and follows him out of the party as he goes to examine the next group of people. Not a minute passes and another guy with an impressive armor set up joins us.

"Hello, Diabel said I should join you guys," He says.

Agil claps his hands to get our attention and we all turn around to see him.

"Well, we are Tank team B," he exclaims in a cheerful tune, "let's work hard together."

We all nod and shake hands, completing what I can only describe as some sort of party bond. Diabel makes a few rounds around the parties checking if everything was in place and shortly after that he returns to the center of the stage.

He explains the division of all the people in the meeting. Two tank groups, A and B. These teams will keep the attention of the boss and would try to keep up a defense against its attacks. We are basically moving duckies in a shooting gallery for it. Groups C to E are assault teams, they will focus on dealing the actual damage to the boss while taking out the sentinels. Aeri ends up on group E whose leader is a guy with really funny shaped hair. Group F is to support the assault teams and attack if need be.

A last group is made with only two people in it. Group G is made up only two individuals, a girl with a red-ish cloak and a boy with black hair who just seems too familiar to me. They will focus on helping out group E when taking on the Sentinels.

Diabel also adds that the Col will be split evenly among all the players in the raid and that the items acquired during the raid will follow the rule of "Drop to Player". This basically just means that the items will go to the player that gets them. With all explained the different parties split into smaller groups while still keeping their respective parties in their HUDs. I still have Agil's name along with another four below my health bar.

Soon enough the only ones left in the lowest point of the amphitheater are me and Aeri.

"Funny how you ended up with that creepy guy anyways."

"Oh, shut up," she mutters.

"It's still somewhat early, want to get something to eat before heading to the inn?" I ask.

"Yeah, sure. Why not?" she answers.

We exit the amphitheater and go around the main plaza a bit before finding a bar we finally decide to go into. Going inside the background music is quickly changes for a more cheerfully, cantina-esque kind of tune. We head straight to the bar and sit in a pair of high chairs on its side.

"Two sandwiches and a couple of beers please," I hail to the bar man.

"Beer? I know you recently had your birthday, but I'm pretty sure you can't drink yet," Aeri says.

"Yeah, well good luck getting drunk out of virtual beer," I say as I pass along one of the mugs and one of the sandwiches to her.

"Oh, for me? Here I thought you were going to eat them both by yourself," she says while smirking at me.

"The fact that you piss the fuck out of me doesn't mean I should stop being a gentleman," I reply while taking a bite out of my food.

"Hah, so you have been treating me like a princess or something?"

"Nope, just like I would treat any other girl. As long as you are eating in the same table as I am, I'll pitch."

"Haha, so your manners don't go out of the dinner table?" she mocks.

"You want to talk about manners?" I reply.

"Hmph," she exclaims before taking a long sip out of her beer, "I've never had beer, but this is what I imagine it would taste like. Funny."

"That's a weird comment…" I say.

We eat our food in a fast quiet manner and have some more beers as the day passes by.

"You know something, I don't feel drunk, but, my HUD sure is getting blurry for some reason." says Aeri.

I didn't notice before but my HUD is blurry as well. I feel fine and there definitely was no way I'm drunk. After all my, body probably lies on a hospital ward. I cringe and chuckle a bit at the thought and down what's left of my beer.

"I hope this isn't like other games where they let your character drink," I say.

"Huh? Why is that?" Aeri mutters.

"Well, if they let the character drink they also kind of blur the screen and the character control becomes stupidly difficult."

I turn my head around and see a couple of guys head for the door almost stumbling as they do so. Please SAO, don't be like other games. The late afternoon turns into night and I find myself still drinking and chatting a little with Aeri.

"Well, seven beers in and I feel completely fine!" chants Aeri.

She moves her hand near her mug and pushes it to the ground without noticing. It crashes and breaks in the ground. Some of the people at the bar turn around and cheer as this happens.

"It is really blurry now though," she adds.

"I think it's about time we head for the inn," I comment.

She gets up and wobbles a little.

"Come on, now you are just faking it," I say.

"You try standing up, you big idiot," she replies.

I move around and get my feet to the ground as I try to get up from my seat. My body feels heavy and sluggish, but there is none of the other effects I've heard you get if you get drunk. No dizziness or slur of speech. Just plain sluggish movements which I can only assume is caused by the game registering our characters have had a little too many beers.

"Well then, let's try to get to the inn," I say while I start walking to the door.

I felt pathetic as I almost stumble my way to the bar's door. Outside the chilly air finally hits my face as I breathe it in slowly. Aeri is exiting the bar as she suddenly crashes against me almost toppling me over.

"Hey watch where you are going!" she yells.

"I was standing still woman!" I reply.

I help her on her feet and we start heading towards the inn. The blurry HUD bothers me greatly, it makes it hard to see where you are headed. This greatly complicates things as we just try our very best to reach the inn.

Finally by some miracle we are able to reach the familiar looking facade and I hear Daath's voice.

"Where were you two all day today?" he questions.

"We were in your meeting thing, we got ourselves a place in the boss raid tomorrow," Aeri says while holding unto the inn's door frame.

"Really? Are you guys up for that?" Daath asks.

"You better believe it," I say trying to mock Aeri.

The HUD's blurriness starts to fade away slowly and it finally returns to its original state after a few seconds.

"It's finally over!" Aeri cries as she kneels.

Daath with a confused expression heads to the stairs and goes up to his room.

"Do you mind waking me up tomorrow for the raid?" Aeri asks me.

I nod and start getting up the stairs to the hallway of rooms. As I'm about to reach my door I hear a creaking sound. Three doors to the left I see Elina's head popping out of her room. I sigh to myself and beckon her over as I open my door. She runs over to me and gets in my room quickly. I'm about to close the door as I see Daath coming out of his room.

"Hey, I won't be going to the raid in a group, but I don't think it'll hurt if I show up now would it?" he says

"I don't think it would, besides you would be of great help," I say.

He nods and closes his door. He is a man of few words. I scratch my head a little and turn to my room as I close the door.

"Alright, what are we going to talk about today?"

* * *

**December/4th/2022**

Before leaving the inn with Aeri I checked Daath's room to find it empty. Somewhat disappointed we left to rendezvous with that raid group at ten. After we were all gathered we set out to the tower. After almost an hour and a half of walking to the tower maze and going up through it, we finally stood in-front of the acclaimed big metal door. With colorful designs off beasts engraved on it a raid group of about forty four stand in line waiting for its passage to open. It's massive and you can't help but to feel somewhat powerless in front of it.

"This feels ominous," Agil mutters beside me.

"What do you mean ominous?" asks one of the guys in our group.

"Foreboding," I answer with intent of confusing the poor soul some more.

Agil chuckles and puts his fist next to him just as I bump it with my own. Diabel makes himself visible in front of the group and we all stiffen up as he places his hand on the center of the door. Glancing around quickly I locate Aeri and see her grin widely as she reaches for her sword. She is truly a maniac or she just really enjoys fighting.

"Let's go!" he yells before pushing the doors with all his might.

As the doors slowly creeps open, a vast room reveals itself. With little to no light in the room, we start to make our way in slowly. Group after group we enter. The room is big and you are able to see the end of it but it still seems too far apart from the exit.

We are all just about to get in when darkness suddenly fills all of the room. Just like in any other cliché boss fight torches from the back of the room start lighting up one by one till they reach the very door we came in from. With some light finally shining in the room skulls can be seen lying all around. It all just seems too cliché to me and I can't help but to chuckle a bit.

Deeper inside the room, now with some light, a large silhouette is reveals itself. Diabel unsheathes his sword and as he doe so pretty much everyone does the same. I reach to my side and pull out my trusty soon to be a month old sword.

Diabel swiftly swings his sword down and it is finally our time to move. Group A starts running and lets out a furious battle cry which a lot of people just follow to encourage themselves to charge the beast. Right behind them we start running as we shout as well.

As we got closer to the silhouette it suddenly jumps from where it is standing and lands on the ground just a few meters away from group A. With another scream they start attacking the big red beast. It is our job to get the boss's attention as we attack and also to allow for the assault teams to quickly switch in and attack the boss while he isn't really aware of it.

Group A switches with us after a bit of attacking, their group doesn't lose a lot of HP but they still switch us in to start drinking some potions as Agil leads us in to attack. Standing close to the boss almost makes me freeze in fear, as it easily stands two meters tall above me. It growls loudly as it swings at us with a massive axe like thing. Agil easily parries a few of his blows and counter attacks swiftly as he backs up for me to jump in.

With a sword skill at the ready I attack the towering enemy with all my might. Not paying too much attention as I do so I only manage to hit it three times before it hits me hard with its axe. The attack takes a little part of my hit points and makes me stand back as the next person in our group jumps in to continue attacking. The whole room is in total mayhem. The assault groups are focusing on attacking the boss from behind as the support ones are completely concentrating on the sentinels that pop out as we started attacking the boss.

In the midst of the chaos I spot Aeri who is moving at her amazing speed through and around her team mates to attack the boss as my group still distracts it. I take some time as we switch back with group A to assess Illfang's moves and try for a more effective set of moves when it came to be my chance to attack again.

Not much time passes and we are already able to deplete the first bar of the blood lusting beast. It growls more fiercely and louder as we keep attacking it, we aren't letting it get a breather. The switches between tank groups and assault groups are fluid and we are taking all the advantage of the slow response time of the boss.

"This is great, we are doing really good!" Agil shouts as I step in after him to attack.

With a defensive mindset this time along a parry two of its swings before counterattacking with a three hit combo. I jump back and let the next player take my place as I rejoin Agil.

"Don't chant victory so early," I say, "We still got a long way to go."

Agil seems understanding and he just nods as we wait for the rest of our group to be ready again.

Switch in and switch out we are finally down to half of the penultimate bar of the boss' health. I just switch out when I notice my health reach the yellow level. I quickly take out a potion and drink it, my HP starts to regenerate slowly. I see Aeri jump and preform a mad combo of quick devastating swings with her sword. With that we reach the final health bar of the Kobold King.

Dropping its axe and shield the beast roars furiously as it reaches out for its second blade. This is it. The last stage of the boss. We are almost there. Diabel's group surrounds the beast and is ready to start their attack. With more howling and roars Illfang raises its blade skywards.

"Get ready!" Agil commands as we all get in our defensive positions.

The demonic enemy jumps into the air and does crazy acrobatics before coming down with his blade first, attacking Diabel's group suddenly leaving them all incapacitated. Awe struck my group just stands there as we watch the hit points of Diabel's group go under the fifty percent.

"A-Attack!" Agil shouts.

Heeding his orders along with my team we all charge towards the beast as it recovers from using its skill. Before we can even reach it, it is already charging another skill. To no avail we reach the enemy too late. It has already launched an attack against Diabel, the very leader of this whole raid.

Illfang launches Diabel into the air, above all the players fighting in the room. Diabel's health drops some more, but it is nothing we can't not recover from. Suddenly Illfang jumps in the air and with its sword shining it hits Diabel three times with amazing speed. Diabel struggles helplessly while in the air.

Diabel is blasted towards the door of the room and slams against the floor with brutal force. His HP gauge flashes red and I can no longer see him so far into the room. I feel someone pulling me forcefully as he saves me from one of the boss's attack.

"Be careful!" says a familiar voice.

"Daath!" I gasp, "holy fuck, you sure did take your sweet time."

He grins at me as he pulls out his sword. From the back of the room a flash of blue light is seen. Someone died, someone just died. Diabel? No…no way. I panic a little and feel my legs shake a little as I still stand near the boss.

"We need to stand back, now!" Agil yells.

Both group A and B start to push back to the entrance. I can hear screams of agony and despair as I myself, along with Daath begin moving backwards. As we are moving backwards group G runs through us. The boy with black hair is rushing the boss with a sword skill at the ready. Beside him runs a girl with chestnut colored hair and a rapier at hand.

"They are going to take on the boss on their own!" I shout.

Agil hears me and stops running, stopping the group in the process.

"Everyone! Forget running away, Attack!" He yells

I smile at him and get my sword ready to attack. I lose Daath from my sight, but it doesn't matter. I breathe in deeply and shout with all my might as I follow Agil into battle. He rushes towards the boss first and I am just some steps behind. I see the black haired swordsman kneel as Illfang is about to strike him.

Agil runs faster and manages to block the beast's blow before it reaches the swordsman. Incredibly Agil knocks back Illfang quite some distance as he himself almost didn't move from his spot.

"Drink your potion until it's finished. Group B is the bulwark, that hasn't changed!" Agil says to the swordsman.

"Don't surround the boss! If you do he'll use his ranged skills. You can take him one by one, just use your blocking and you can make so it doesn't even hit you!" The swordsman shouts in my direction.

Agil turns to me and with a grin signals that it is my turn. Alright, let's do this. I place my blade on my right side and see it glow before turning my head to Illfang. Again, maybe just because of the sheer thrill of the battle I shout my lungs out as I jump to attack the boss. Hitting it successfully I drop to the ground and see as he prepares to attack me. I have no time to block and make a run for it, suddenly I remember the swordsman's words and place my sword in front of me as I try to read the boss' next move.

The few seconds it takes for it to ready its attack feel like minutes to me. As soon as I see the general direction in which his blade is traveling I swing my sword against it. Our weapons connect and I feel the repercussion of the strike as it travels up my arm. Sparks fly around all about as I am able to overcome the boss' swing and make him stagger a little. Needless to say, I feel like a god as I do this.

"Switch!" I yell just as another member of my group jumps in.

I jump back and stand beside Agil as he nods at me. I can't help but to grin and he does so too. Suddenly the battle takes a turn for the positive, we are engaging the boss again and everyone who does looks incredibly motivated. The swordsman that gave us the blocking tip stands back and starts shouting the directions in which the boss was going to attack.

A giggle from behind the room makes my head turn and I am able to see Aeri fighting alongside with Daath as they try to take on some sentinels. They are switching in and out with an amazing speed and they give no quarter to the enemy they are attacking.

"Get out of there! Now!" Shouts the swordsman.

One of the tanks in our group found itself over behind the boss. With people behind and in front of him the boss recognizes it is surrounded. Ilffang smirks and jumps into the air as it roars violently. It is the same attack he used to neutralize Diabel's group. I look at my hit points and gasp as I realize they are below fifty percent. This is it…I'm going to die.

Just as I am ready to accept my fate the black haired swordsman flies over us and hits Illfang with an amazing sword skill. He makes the giant beast twist its body in the air as it plummets down on its side.

"Everyone! Full Attack! Surround it now!" our savior shouts.

I hear whirring sounds all around me and see flashes of multiple colors as my whole group readies their sword skills.

"Let's do this!" I yell.

We charge at the boss and surround it as we started unleashing our sword skills simultaneously. We start depleting the boss's HP as we attack. Almost at the same time we all back up as we let our cool down period start. We don't even start to charge our next skills when the boss starts to rise from the floor.

"It's now or never! Hit it with everything!" Agil yells from the top of his lungs.

The whirring sound comes back on and with a wild flash of colors we start pummeling Illfang again. Once again we enter the cool down period but the boss is still rising from the ground. As if everyone was thinking the same thing we all start to back up as the massive beast rises from the ground.

Suddenly, the girl with the rapier swishes by my side as she launches herself in the air to attack the boss. She does a linear strike through the boss and drops to the ground as the swordsman follows behind her with a similar technique. This was different, very different. Right as he slices through the enemy he curls his weapon and draws a "V" on the boss as he nicks through his armor. With that Illfang let out his final roar.

* * *

The boss had disappeared into little crystals of light as the black haired swordsman and his partner took a breath. Everyone including myself stands in awe as a shocking silence filled the air. With a "bloop" like sound a result screen appears before me.

"Yeah! We did it!" someone shouts.

Along with that the whole crowd of people starts celebrating and hugging each other. We won, we really did it! Daath and Aeri join me as Agil leaves to talk with the black haired hero.

"You ok, Al?" Daath asks me.

I nod and smile as I breathe in deeply.

"We did it man!" I say.

Aeri and Daath grin at me and we start clapping out of joy. Other people around join us in victory.

"Why?!" someone shouts successfully breaking the victory mood.

We all turn to the source of the voice and see a scimitar user standing in the middle of everyone with teary eyes. Behind him stand three other individuals who are also on the verge of crying.

"Why did you let Diabel die?!" he says with a wretched voice.

Diabel did die…the leader of the raid is now gone. Deciphering where he is looking at I turn my head and my eyes meet the black haired swordsman.

"Let him…die?" he answers.

"Th-that's right! You know the bosses skills and moves, if you had given Diabel that information he wouldn't have died!"

What the hell was this guy talking about? Players all around start muttering things to each other and the atmosphere takes a turn for the chaotic. The swordsman stands next to his partner and Agil with a confused expression.

"Wait…I know this guy! He is a beta tester!" someone yells from behind.

I hear people gasping and the muttering intensifies, a mace wielding player steps towards from my side and raises his hand to get everyone's attention.

"Even so, if he is a beta tester. Doesn't that mean he has the same information as the one posted in the strategy guide?" he says.

With his comment everyone grows quiet until another disturbed voice decides to speak.

"That's it! The strategy guide Argo gave us is nothing more than lies! That player is a beta tester after all, there's no way she would give away important information for free."

The room suddenly becomes a hornet's nest everyone starts screaming at the black haired player and I am afraid this is seconds away from becoming another fight.

"What are these shitheads doing?" I ask.

Daath puts his hand on my shoulder and puts his finger over his lips. Quietly agreeing to shut up I turn to the growing turmoil of people in-front of me.

"A beta tester huh?" says the black haired player, "Don't put me in the same category as those amateurs."

What? The player that started this whole discussion is just about to speak again but the swordsman interrupts him.

"Listen and listen well. SAO's closed beta had a low acceptance rate. Out of the one thousand people who were chosen, how many of them do you think were hardcore gamers? Most of them were pathetic newbies that didn't even know how to level up properly. Even you guys are better than them now," he says.

Every single soul in the room grows quiet and I feel Daath's hand apply some pressure on my shoulder. For some reason I feel this isn't headed anywhere pretty.

"Do not dare to compare me with those beta testers," he continues, "during the beta testing period I reached floors no one else did. I learned the skills used by this very boss and had even more information than this Argo you are talking about."

"That's not even at the level of the beta testers! That's cheating, you are cheater!" someone yells.

People all around start shouting the words "cheater" and "beta tester", it takes a few second but the shouts and screams suddenly gave birth to a new word. "Beater".

"That's right, I am a beater. And from now on…don't put me in the same category as those pathetic beta testers," says the beater as he changes his coat for another one as black as night.

With those final words the beater turns his back on us and starts walking towards the stairs in the end of the boss's room.

"That cheating bastard!" Aeri growls next to me.

"Daath…this guy-" I say.

Turning my head a little is all it take to see the face of my partner. Fueled by rage an angry frown takes over his face. Never in my life had I been so terrified to stand close to someone.

"That stupid idiot…" Daath mumbles.

The beater had long left us and Daath starts running to the spiral staircase that is the only way into the second floor for now. Spacing out a little bit I stare as he rushes up the stairs.

"Let's follow him!" Aeri says as she pushes me forwards.

I nod and start sprinting to the stairs, I see Daath reach the top and forcefully pry the doors open. With Aeri tagging along behind me, we run up the stairs. Aeri quickly passes me and keeps running until she reaches the door.

"Come on, quickly!" she yells.

I pass her as she stands near the door and start going down a huge set of winding stairs. The Beater stands at the bottom with his menu open. He then closes it and starts walking away. I can see Daath is about to reach him. What in the world are you going to do Daath?

"You idiot, you realize what you just did?!" Daath yells.

The black coated player turns to him just as soon as I catch up with Daath and him at the bottom of the stairs. Not answering he just stands there without even muttering a word.

"We'll be hunted god dammit and it's your entire fault! You just did the coup de grace on our reputation as beta testers!" Daath says outraged.

"Daath is…a beta tester?" Aeri asks me as she catches up.

I say nothing and keep my mouth shut as I watch the beater and Daath in front of me.

"Didn't you hear me back there? I'm not like you, I'm a beater. Don't think you can compare yourself with me," replies the swordsman.

Daath's frown becomes even scarier as he grinds his teeth together.

"Oh that is it…" Daath groans.

He opens his menu and furiously going through it he sends a duel invite to the beater. Shocked at first the beater does nothing but then smiles.

"As you wish then," the beater replies.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

This chapter was incredibly fun to write (even more so to fix for some reason), I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Same as always, if you like what you read why not leave a review?

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Daath's Beater"


	7. Chapter 7 - Daath's Beater

**Chapter 7.- Daath's Beater**

**December/4th/2022**

**Daath**

-Half Loss Mode-

I just don't care anymore. I just want to fight this smug-face player in front of me.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" says Al.

Maybe I am, but I won't stand still while this guy ends tearing beta testers a new one. The black coated player accepts my duel invitation and the countdown appears with both of our names on top of us.

-Daath V.S. Kirito-

"You lied to me then? You are a beta tester as well." I hear Aeri say.

"The topic never popped up, I didn't lie," I reply, "but if you think I'm as bad as this guy, be my guest."

Her look becomes somewhat stern and I unsheathe my sword quickly. Kirito does the same and I stand in awe as we hold the same blade.

"So you got it too, huh?" I ask.

"Anneal Blade plus six." He replies.

Mine is only plus five. That thought travels around my head for way too long and I start getting a little nervous. It doesn't matter if his blade is better or not, it will all come down to who is the better swordsman. The level of his weapon only means his attack damage will be higher, but I can deal with that. I definitely can.

"Al, go get Elina," I say.

"She can wait man, I'm not leaving un-"

"Go now, take Aeri with you," I order.

His face shows unwillingness but he turns and grabs Aeri's arm and pulls her upstairs. As I refocus I notice the countdown. Ten seconds left. Kirito stands in front of just a few feet away holding his sword with one hand just like I do. His face is completely relaxed and he even looks a little too comfortable. Is this some kind of trick? Mind games perhaps?

-5-

I relax my hand and let my blade sway a little as I get on a more comfortable position. No big deal, I can do this. I relax my body a bit more and see as Kirito completely lowers his blade. What is he doing?

-4-  
-3-  
-2-  
-1-

Kirito completely sheathes his blade as the countdown reaches zero. He sighs and crosses his arms. Is this guy mocking me?

"What are you doing?" I ask.

"It is not within my intentions to fight you," he replies calmly, "I was merely waiting for your friends to leave."

"What? Why?"

"Look, I did what I did for a reason. This new thing, this term "beater" will spare a lot of beta testers trouble."

If anything it will just make things harder for us, we will be judged without prejudice. They will even hunt us down more viciously than they already have been doing. What Kirito is saying doesn't make any sense in my head.

"Why would it? Soon enough we'll all be known as "Beaters", soon we'll be all treated the same again," I say angrily.

"That, you might be right, but as of now I am the only Beater, and that alone just saved a lot of beta testers," he says calmly.

I "tsk" at him and sheathe my sword slowly. His attitude pisses me off for some reason.

"Then what was all that about? Back in the boss room. Why did you do it?"

He looks at the ground and says nothing. He then goes to a nearby boulder and sits on it calmly.

"As I already said two times, it was to redirect the coming problems from beta testers to me alone," he mutters.

It takes me a bit to realize and I feel as he if he called me stupid when he said that. It is a little true I just didn't get his point until now. His plan is for the anger of all players to be directed to Beaters in this case him and not to all of the beta testers. Why do something like that? Why sacrifice your own security for that?

"Ok, I get it now, but why take the blame then?" I question.

He scrolls through his open menu a bit and takes a fruit out of his inventory. He grabs it and proceeds to take a bite of his now materialized apple.

"Simple really, I wouldn't want others to carry the burden of the one mistake I committed in the boss room," he says after swallowing.

"That mistake being?"

He takes another bite and stays silent for a few seconds as he gazes into the distant city of Urbus.

"The mistake being…the fact that I kept my mouth shut."

I find myself more puzzled than before, I don't know this guy nor his intentions and what he says just makes my mind boggle with questions as I try to make sense of what he even is trying to say. Did he really do it for all the beta testers or is it some kind of scheme that will only benefit him in the long run. I have no way of knowing this and I feel seriously annoyed at that fact.

"Do you really think you could've changed something of what happened back there?" I utter.

Kirito sighs loudly and his expression turns grim.

"I could've saved Diabel," he mutters.

"Is that it?"

He turns his face towards me with a confused look.

"I could've saved a live, why would you say something like that?" he questions.

"Diabel as you know him was nothing else but scum. A part of me is glad he is dead."

He stands up and his expression becomes puzzled as mine. I also notice some anger in it. He quickly gives me his back to hide it, but I'm more than certain I had hit a tender spot.

"You are glad…because of person's death?" he mumbles.

"Yes," I reply without hesitating.

"Heh…you are really scary."

I chuckle a bit and cross my arms as I move my feet a little, getting on a more comfortable stance.

"I've heard that a little too often in the past days."

"I know about you, Datell," he says.

I tense up suddenly and I can feel myself making an angry frown. He turns towards me again and now he crosses his arms and gives me a wide smirk.

"Why do you call him scum when you killed players?"

I clench my fist tight and try not to lunge at him.

"I only killed player killers." I reply.

"It is still player killing. Tell me, if it weren't because of the boss. Wouldn't you be planning to kill Diabel?" says Kirito.

"I let him off with a warning, the boss only made it so he never make a mistake again."

His smirk becomes even wider and he walks closer to me. He says nothing while doing so and he now stands less than two feet away from me. He eyes me a bit as I try not to do anything impulsive. Hanging around Al must be rubbing on me more than I care to admit.

"Datell, the player killer killer," he says. "too bad we won't be able to keep tabs on each other after this."

"Huh? Why wouldn't we? I assume we have a mutual friend that handles information," I reply.

"After this incident I very much doubt she'll be divulging any kind of info related to beta testers," he adds.

That makes me a little tense. Argo herself is a beta tester. So if anything she will want to disappear for a while at first. Later on, it makes sense for her not to sell any more info about beta testers since it would compromise her integrity as well.

"Alright, that I can agree with you," I comment.

He nods and turns his back to me, again.

"Now, if you would be so kind to give up the duel."

My blood boils as I hear this.

"I don't just give up…beater," I say.

He freezes on the spot and reaches for his Anneal blade. He chuckles a bit as he turns to me yet again. I reach for my sword as well and place it in front of me as I smile.

"This shall be interesting," Kirito says, "may the best swordsman win then."

"Yeah, this is merely a display of skill," I reply.

He quickly dashes against me with his sword glowing. This takes me by surprise, but I'm quick enough to barely parry his quick attack. I feel as our swords collide against each other and I jump back to get some room between him and myself.

"So eager to hurt someone," I mock.

"This is merely a display of skill, didn't you say that just now?" he says with a smile.

I find myself chuckling again as I hear my sword making its ready whirring sound. With my sword now shining I get close to him making slow careful steps until he is near enough. Letting the system go about its business I let go and quickly connect a few blows with his sword. Tiny sparks fly off as we swipe at each other and block our attacks.

I launch another attack and he parries it with a sword skill making my blade blow back more than I expected it to. Not wasting a second Kirito attacks my chest area as I try to get away. He manages to connect 3 swipes and I find my health awfully close three quarters full.

"Nice counter attack," I huff.

He only smiles and stands there with his sword in front of him as if he is trying to read my mind. He looks relaxed and flowing, I cannot picture myself fighting as he does. He looks so calm, so…ready.

Doing some quick steps towards me he attacks me, but leaves an opening for me. I dodge his attack, ducking under his blade and make my sword whir as I manage a skyward slice right on his center. A critical hit. This drops his health absurdly close to half and makes me throw a fit in my head for leaving it that close.

"You got some nice moves yourself, Datell." he groans.

"The name is Daath," I reply with anger.

We start circling each other, both with our swords at the ready, we go around each other not making another move other than the circular strafe.

"I wonder how long can you run from your past. Something tells me you enjoyed doing what you did," he mocks.

I suppress the urge to attack blindly from his taunt and keep moving in a circle as he does the same.

"Datell is dead. This is the new me!"

Filled with anger I see him move and start running towards him with the intention of attacking him. Hanging out around Al definitely rubs off on me. He quickly dodges my attack and delivers the final blow of the duel right in my stomach. This drops my HP below half and I just kneel immediately, admitting defeat.

"I'll take my leave now," he says while turning around.

"Hey beater…" I mumble.

He stops for a second and tilts his head with intent of hearing me out. I sheathe my sword and get on my feet as I fumble through my pockets looking for a potion.

"Good fight," I mutter.

He returns his head to its original position and starts walking away towards the city of Urbus. It was a great duel, if it weren't because I got ahead of myself I might have even won. It's in the past now, though. I walk over to the nearby boulder and sit on it as I hang my head. I punch the rock I'm sitting on and sigh loudly, loud enough as if I were hoping someone could hear me.

A smile suddenly washes the anger away as I notice where I'm contextually sitting. The second floor, we finally made it. After almost a a month, we are finally here. I grin to myself and relax as I place my arms around my neck.

The second floor is brutally different from the first. As an avid player I think it's only common sense to expect this, given that's just how games go. You are in a forest area and all of the sudden the next level is in a cave full of lava. SAO kind of has this kind of drastic alterations, but it at least tries to make the escalation between levels somewhat believable.

High peaks and an almost arid landscape displays itself before my eyes as I look away towards Urbus. The second floor mostly consists of oddly shaped mountains and weird craters. As for atmosphere the second floor is incredibly gloomy, it gives off the same feeling Starting City was giving out when I visited it not long ago. The background music changes too, for bad or worse it just makes this floor feel a lot darker.

"Daath!"

I turn my head to the stairs and see Elina rushing down the stairs, Al is following not far from her. Almost at the very top of the stairs I manage to spot Aeri. She is slowly going down the steps it looks as if she is trying to keep her distance from the group.

"I'm so happy you are ok," says Elina as she approaches me.

I smile and stand up from the boulder to greet her properly, but as soon as she reaches me she pushes me with all her strength.

"Why didn't you guys tell me you were going to the boss fight though?" she complains.

"We didn't want you worrying so much, it seemed…logical," I answer.

She pouts and Al finally reaches the bottom of the stairs.

"Where's the dude with the black coat?" he asks.

"He left just a few minutes ago."

"Did you win?" he asks.

I shake my head and sigh. Al looks surprised and I notice a hint of shock on Elina's face.

"Fuck…I thought you were the best player out there. It seemed like so at least…so far," Al mutters.

"You didn't get hurt badly did you?" Elina asks concerned.

I pat her head and shake my head again. She smiles and hugs me gently.

"So, Mr. Beater." says Aeri.

"What?" I reply.

She proceeds to look away as she gets closer and makes that annoying sound of discontent of hers as she get closer.

"Are you a scum bag beta tester like that other guy?" she snaps at me.

I smirk at her and chuckle a bit.

"I haven't killed you yet have I?"

Elina immediately stops hugging and backs away a few steps and I see Al raise his eyebrow. Did I just seriously say that out loud?

"Dude what the hell did you just say…?" says Al.

"Err…sorry I'm just not in the mood," I mumble, "look Aeri, I'm not a beater…although I'll surely be known as one soon…probably. I'm not like the other guy. I helped you so far anyways haven't I?"

She nods in an unsure manner and gets her black hood off her face. She grabs her chin and looks away a little. She is incredibly docile sometimes.

"Well….I guess you are right. You are…well a good man I guess," she admits, "don't say stuff like that again though…you seriously scared me."

I see Elina nod along with her and shrug a little as I think back on that phrase I said moments ago.

"So, how did you lose to this guy?" Aeri asks.

"I really don't want to talk about it."

She backs away and I start walking in the general direction of Urbus. I start hearing as everyone tags along behind me. They are talking behind me, but I'm too deep into my thoughts to care. Kirito, this beater… What did he mean by how long I could run from my past?

His words trouble me greatly, they spin wildly around my head as we keep walking. Datell is not any kind of multiple personality. It is just my past player character. No one chooses to act like their true self when playing games. They are a form of escapism, you go to games to become that you cannot be in the real world.

It suddenly hits me across the face. Datell the character I created. Did I use it as a surrogate? Did I use it to escape reality and become a murdering vigilante? It all makes a horrifying amount of sense to the point it spooks me. I shake my head violently and pinch the part of my nose located between my eyes.

I am not Datell…I do not have some kind of identity disorder. I am Daath…I am…I'm just another character I created…

"Daath, are you ok?" Elina asks.

"Yeah…yeah. I'm fine," I struggle to say.

She purses her lips and pouts. I got too much going on my head I can't even focus on walking properly. I stop dead on my tracks and stand there without doing a thing.

"Are you sure…?" Elina asks.

I nod as I come back to reality and start walking again. The city of Urbus is just a few minutes away and its crater becomes clearly visible. As I keep walking I realize something, something that scares me even more. I lied to Kirito. As Datell I did enjoy killing player killers. It felt as if I were some kind of corrupted hero, making the right thing in my own way. In my own twisted way.

It now has consequences I will never be able to kill in this game again without the moral heaviness of actual murder. In a disgusting way….this troubles me.

"Seriously, what the hell is going on with you now?" Al says.

"I said I'm fine, I just need some rest," I reply harshly, "I'll head to the inn right away, you guys should go to the main plaza, maybe open the gate while you are at it."

Just as I say that I spring off and start running towards the entrance of Urbus. As I run I quickly message Argo. I want to talk with her…maybe she'll give me some god dammed therapy like she did last time. Tired and out of breath I reach the inn, I walk inside and see the NPC in charge of it.

"I'll rent out a room please."

She nods with a gentle smile and I transfer over the Col. As I walk to my room I start feeling heavy and get a painful headache. I barely manage to open the door and stumble inside to sit on the chair near the bed.

"I'm not having a stupid nervous breakdown," I mutter to myself.

Finally sitting down I change to my town clothes and feel relieved as the somewhat heavy armor is removed off my body. I sit and breathe in and out as slowly as I possibly can. The headache starts to fade away slowly and I feel more relaxed as I exhale air.

I stand up and peek out my window, hearing a faint sound coming from the street. Adjusting my view a little I see a few players coming from the plaza. I can hear shouts of joy and people laughing as I see more players flood the street. It seems like someone other than my party opened the gate at Urbus plaza. This would allow players waiting back at Starting City to reach the second floor without having to go through the maze. I feel happy at that fact and sit again on my chair.

I hear a knock on the door and stand up to open it. A see a hooded player right before me and she smirks at me widely.

"Whiskers, that was faster than I expected," I say.

"I do move fast," she replies, "What do you need this time?"

I smile and signal her to come in.

"Well, I'm not looking for information this time. I'll tell you that much."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

Daath's character acts as sort of the core of the group. SO naturally he has to be the one to keep his shit together, you know. for everyone's sake.

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Two Sides to The Coin"


	8. Chapter 8 - Two Sides to The Coin

**Chapter 8.- Two Sides To The Coin**

**December/4th/2022**

**Daath**

Talking to Argo takes quite some time if you are not looking for information. Luckily I assume I have grown on her to the point she doesn't mind giving me some sort of life counseling. The life in SAO so far has been a tough one. The ever looming presence of death can be overwhelming, but I guess you just have to learn to live with it, and treat death itself like a friend.

It is an odd feeling, but it's all any player has for sure right now. As long as we have the NerveGear strapped to our heads death can come from everywhere. It can come from the monsters you need to fight, from the players you'll encounter, pretty much from every aspect in this game of death. The most terrifying thing of it all is that it can also come from the real world, with no warning at all. It is truly scary.

"There's really nothing to worry your dumb head about you know," Argo says.

I rub my forehead and rest my weight on my elbows as I slump a little.

"You really think so? The little time it took me to reach Urbus thoughts just plagued my brain, I'm tired and this headache seems to have come to stay," I reply.

She pats my back a few times and gets off the chair she was sitting on. For the first time in all the time I've known her, she gives me a sincere smile and puts her hood back on her head.

"Just don't lose yourself alright? You are who you are, if that makes any sense to you," she says, "character or not, you have to be true to yourself at some point."

Her words confuse me somewhat more than they manage to clear up my ideas, but in some way I feel they'll eventually make sense. I nod at her and she makes her way to the door of the dark room.

"Hey, Whiskers."

She stops and turns her head to me.

"Thank you, I appreciate that you took the time to meddle with me," I say.

"All in a day's work," she says as she leaves the room.

I sit back on my chair and breathe in and out deeply a few more times. I'm a mess of a person right now, but I hope to, at the very least, be able to pretend I'm not in a convincing manner. A beeping sound alerts me and I see it is a message. Opening it surprises me, as it from the person I least expected to receive this kind of message.

From: Aeri  
To: Daath  
Subject:-  
Message: Are you doing alright? Al and Elina left to god knows where. So, how about we meet at the town's square? There's some kind of party/celebration thing going on.

I smile at the fact that even after that weird sort of quarrel we had when entering the second floor, I didn't destroy our relationship. I reply agreeing to meet her and leave my room with my weapons and armor stashed away in my room's storage. It has been a while since I felt this light. I usually go to sleep with some other shirt since sleeping in armor is quite uncomfortable, but walking around in town clothes feels really nice.

I feel more agile and swift for some reason. Stepping out of the inn, I am able to see what Aeri means by celebration in her message. This is the true meaning of a Town Opening. Players, hundreds of them drown the streets, cheers of joy and shouts of immeasurable happiness can be heard loudly on the street level. What would usually look like a deserted city back in the beta now resembles a flourishing carnival of celebration.

Walking down the street just makes me feel incredibly lively, it may sound dumb, but it really does. People all around are singing, laughing, hugging each other, it is an amazing view. For the first time in almost a month everyone is happy. It is as if for a second everyone forgot we are trapped. I am happy and overjoyed as well. We have finally beaten the first floor and we are going head first into the second one, it is an amazing feeling. Then again, that feeling of fear and dread doesn't seem to leave my mind completely.

"Hey! Daath!"

A few steps away from me I see Aeri running towards me with something in her hand. As she gets closer, I'm able to see she is eating something out of a stick, which she holds in her right hand. The thought combined with the sight of the food itself makes me awfully hungry all of the sudden.

"Having fun, huh?" I say.

She nods with a smile and finishes her food eliminating any hope I had of stealing some from her.

"This is amazing, I never thought I could have so much fun around tons of people!" she says.

"That is…a very odd statement," I reply. "Anyways, what's up?"

"Nothing really, I just want to talk about a few things." she replies.

"What do you want to talk about?"

She turns away from me and starts walking slowly, having no other choice I follow behind as we walk through the loads of people.

"So, you are a beta tester, right?" she asks.

Why doesn't this surprise me?

"Yes, I am," I answer.

She keeps walking and stops at a vendors mat to buy something. I see her go through the shop's menu, scrolling up and down as she hums some song which for some reason I vaguely remember.

I knew the topic would arise but she is either tricking me or just showing the weirdest kind of interest I've ever seen.

"So can you tell me now why is it that you didn't tell me about it earlier?"

I open the vendor's menu as I start looking for some potions myself. I try to avoid the question, hoping she would change it or something, but she just asks again.

"So? Are you going to tell me?" she insists.

I sigh as I buy my stuff.

"Why is it that you want to know? Will it change anything?"

She buys something as well and opens her menu to rearrange stuff in her inventory. I'm starting to find her weird way of asking something and then doing something else very annoying. She ignores me for a few seconds and starts humming again.

"It won't change a thing. I'm just curious about you," she says before resuming her humming.

I swear to god I know this song. She closes her menu and starts walking again. Sure enough, I start treading behind her. A group of players passes next to us. They are screaming loudly as they tease each other going down the street.

"If it won't change a thing, why do you insist?"

She blows air out through her nose in an annoyed manner and picks up the pace a little.

"You sure have a way to go around questions, Mr. Beater."

I reach out for her and grab her shoulder, turning her face towards me.

"Don't you call me that," I grunt to her face. "And why the hell are you humming Mozart?!"

Her expression becomes blank and she merely pushes me away slightly.

"You don't scare me," she huffs.

"That's because you don't know me," I reply.

"Because you don't let me."

I stare at her for a brief moment and hang my head.

"Fine, I'll give you ten minutes of my time. Shoot."

Aeri's face suddenly brightens up and she starts walking again as she hums another tune.

"So, first things first, why did you keep it from me?"

"It seemed like the best thing to do. I didn't want any unwanted attention."

"Oh, perhaps...you are scared of me?" she replies with a smirk.

While she is a very strong and kind of psychotic player, I wouldn't exactly say she scares me. She is powerful, but not to the point of actually scaring someone off.

"Not the case, it just seemed better at the time. I really don't know how to express it any better," I add.

She nods in approval as we reach the very center of Urbus. Players still are coming out of the gate connected to the first floor. It is an amazing sight. Seeing flashes of blue light as more happy faces pop into the city. It really is a sight to behold.

I keep walking a little behind her when she decides to sit down on a nearby bench. I stare at her for a few seconds before she pats the free part of the bench, signaling me to sit next to her.

"Something tells me you treat Al really differently," I say as I sit down.

"Al has his things, but he is always mad, so I just treat him like he treats me," she says.

"You got a point there," I reply.

We stay silent for a minute or two and just take in the overall mood of the town. Aeri's body starts shinning as she changes clothes in the middle of town. Putting her armor away she now sits next to me with a long skirt and red blouse with a golden pattern over it. It accents her figure, and I'll be damned if it doesn't make for a good sight.

"You look good," I mutter.

"My my, have I caught your attention?" she says with a weird accent.

"Don't take a compliment for more than it is," I snap back.

She chuckles a bit and looks up to the night sky.

"Well, second question. Why did you leave all of the sudden?"

Another question I really don't want to answer.

"Are you absolutely sure you want to know?" I comment.

"I don't know. Do I?"

"Not really… Trust me."

She hangs her head and crosses her arms.

"Alright, I'll try not to push on that matter," she says, "Can you tell me your real name then?"

"No names, Aeri. We already settled that," I sigh.

"Fine, fine, whatever," she grunts, "What CAN you tell me about yourself then?"

There's very little I'm actually willing to give up to her, but then a thought arises. If I just tell her a lot about me, excluding the bit when I left to talk with Argo, maybe, just maybe, she'll stop asking questions.

"I'm sixteen years old, I like playing soccer and videogames. My tastes in music aren't that interesting. I just listen to whatever the hell is popular at the time. I don't have a specific genre I like. I have a dog and three cats at home. I have a bed ridden sister who is ill that I take care of with my mother. My house isn't too big. It has two floors with limited space to do stuff, although I do have a rather big yard," I say and take a brief pause, "I worked two part time jobs in the real world, both of which I hated. I am a former beta tester of SAO and have been living along side a grumpy guy and clumsy little girl for the last month or so. Recently, I've made an addition to the group of people I hang out with, who turned out to be a rather psychotic, bi-polar, spontaneous girl. Who just happens to be sitting next to me. Oh, and I enjoy long walks on the beach."

She looks my way with a perplexed expression.

"Too much information?" I mock.

"Maybe…" she mutters. "Psychotic? Bi-polar? Really?"

"You laugh while you are killing stuff," I say.

She puts her hand up to her chin and nods slowly.

"Huh… I can see why you think that now."

I look around to see Al and Elina walking together and heading towards us. All too suddenly, Aeri changes to her armor and sits up straight, and she seriously asks why I said the stuff I did.

"What brings your ugly face around here?" she asks loudly.

Al immediately frowns and rubs his forehead a little with his left hand. Elina just keeps walking with a smile on her face.

"Nothing really. I was just hoping to avoid you for the rest of the day," he snarls as he sits next to me.

"Oh, so you were on a date with little Eli," Aeri teases.

Elina's face flushes wildly as she tries to look away from us. Al's expression remains unchanged and he just leans his back on the bench.

"I-it's not like that…" says Elina.

"I'm kidding, sweetie. Of course you are not going out with that grumpy man," Aeri says, laughing a little.

"What were you guys doing anyway?" I ask.

Al puts one of his elbows on his knee as he leans over it and his expression changes to a serious one.

"Someone is following us," he mutters.

Elina nods slowly as she looks around nervously.

"We think it's Klaus's gang thing," Elina mutters with a soft voice.

"The White Snakes?" I say.

They both nod and Al quickly points towards one of the alleyways that can be seen from where we are sitting.

"See?" he exclaims.

A strange white silhouette quickly cowers back into the alley as I turn my head to see.

"The White what?" Aeri asks.

"It's just a soon-to-be guild we had trouble with some time back," Al comments.

"Yeah, Al punched the leader right in the face in front of a crowd of people," I say.

Aeri chuckles a bit.

"Well, they have reasons to be following you then. I guess…"

Al nods and stands up.

"What do we do?" he says.

I stand up as well and put my hand on Al's shoulder. Aeri stands up as well while Elina places herself next to Al.

"How about some interrogation?" I say jokingly.

Aeri and Al both laugh in a macabre way and step forwards.

"Alright," they say at the same time.

Oh...shit.

"Let's go," Al says to Aeri.

She nods and they start running towards the alley. Elina tugs hard on my shirt and stares at me with a worried face.

"What on earth did you just do?!" she says out loud.

I shrug as I start running to the alley myself. I manage to make the run into it just to catch Al making his way up a ladder leading to the roof tops. Hoping that Elina is just behind me, I start going up the ladder myself.

As I make it to the last few bars I can see the flat roof tops and Aeri giving fast chase to the white figure. The roofs in Urbus are all roughly the same size, so it makes for a rather traversable landscape over the streets. I get on the roof top and start running behind Al.

Aeri manages to catch up with the guy dressed in white and tackles him violently. Al catches up as well and holds the man on the ground by putting his knee on the man's back. Elina appears from behind me and helps Aeri from the ground.

"Let me go ya bastards!" the man shouts.

"Who are you and why are you following us?!" Al asks.

The man struggles helplessly under his weight as Elina gets behind me as if she was scared. I pat her back gently and kneel to see the face of the white clothed spy.

"Are we going to need to use force?" I say in a low tone.

The man's eyes widen quickly as he tries even harder to get Al off of him.

"Ok, one more time. Who are you and why are you following us?" Al presses.

The man struggles for a few seconds, groaning and moving below Al. He stops moving and places his forehead on the floor.

"If I tell you…will you let me go?" he mumbles.

"Well that is up to us, but I don't see why there wouldn't be a chance," I comment.

The man sighs loudly and hides his face.

"I was merely hired by a man, his name is Klaus."

Al smiles as he hears this and pushes the man's face against the floor. Elina stands back a bit more and cowers behind Aeri now.

"Are you with the White Snakes as well?!" Al yells.

"Didn't you fucking hear me? I said he only hired me to follow you!" the man groans.

"So, what were you supposed to do after you spied on us?" I question.

The man proceeds to hide his face and starts laughing.

"I'm just the decoy."

I hear a loud shriek from behind me and see about eight men dressed in white as they grab Elina and Aeri. Aeri struggles forcefully, but with more than three guys trying to hold her down she is quickly subdued.

Al screams loudly and jams the man's face against the floor a couple of times before kicking him away from him.

"You bastards! You won't get away with this!" Al screams.

I reach for my back and as I do I'm crudely reminded that I didn't bring my weapon as I try to grasp thin air behind my back. Dammit.

Elina tries to get away from the men's hold on her but her struggle is to no avail as she is considerable smaller than the scum holding her.

"Well, well, what have we here?" says a voice behind the group of people.

Al's face is filled with rage and anger as he hears this voice and unsheathes his blade quickly.

"What do you want with them?! They didn't do anything bad to you!" Al screams.

"They didn't, but you did," says the voice as he finally steps out from behind his minions, "and they are precious to you, and I just want to fuck over your day."

The man Al had described as Klaus is visible in front of me now. A prick like attitude and red hair, with a face you just want to punch.

"Now, let's have a little test shall we?" says Klaus as he unsheathes his sword.

He proceeds to slowly place it under Aeri's neck and presses it slightly. Al stays put and only frowns at Klaus. It seems as he has wants to kill him right now. I will fully support his actions, but without a blade, I am useless.

"Interesting." Klaus mumbles.

Then he quickly switches his blade to Elina's throat and places it forcefully against her skin. Al breathes out heavily and takes a few steps forward as he raises his blade.

"Haha, so it's her, huh?" Klaus mocks, "Leave the other girl, we're taking this one."

Aeri kicks away the men holding her and jumps towards Al and holds him in place.

"He can't hurt her here, Al. We are outnumbered. Let's think this through for a second," Aeri says while trying to restrain Al.

"I won't let him take her! Let me go!" Al shouts.

I quickly run to aid Aeri and hold Al's arms as he struggles to break free.

"Let me go idiots! Let me go!" he screams.

"You'll hear from me soon, Alshep," says Klaus before jumping off the roof.

His people quickly follow and the men holding Elina quickly disappear from our sight. Al stops struggling and he drops to his knees. Aeri stops holding him and sits in front of him. I let go as well and grab my head with both hands as I try to think clearly and push the kidnapping aside for now.

"You fucking idiots…" Al groans.

"Come on, there were like ten of them. Even if we did engage them, aside from the fact that we couldn't have done a thing since we are in a safe zone, we would've lost," Aeri says.

"What if they take her outside a safe zone? They are going to hurt her…" Al murmurs.

"There's nothing we could've do-"

Al stands up quickly and holds Aeri up in the air with both of his hands around her neck.

"You are right! There's nothing you two could've done because you are cowards!" he yells.

I decide to intervene and punch him in the face from the side making him drop Aeri.

"No, we are not cowards. We are just not stupidly impulsive like you," I say. "Look, you big idiot, he'll contact us soon enough. I'm pretty sure he'll want some kind of ransom for her. I promise you, we'll get Elina back safe."

He clenches his fist and lifts his arm a little, ready to punch me back. He stops midway and lets his arm hang as he processes what I said.

"You better be a man of your word," he says with a sour tone.

I nod at him, helping him stand up as Aeri stands behind me.

"I got a message," Al exclaims.

I look back at Aeri who is rubbing her neck and back to Al as he stand with his menu open as he reads.

"So...what does it say?" I ask.

"He wants one hundred thousand Col…" he says, "by tomorrow at the latest…"

It suddenly becomes hard to swallow as I hear this and find myself holding my head again.

"Screw that," Aeri exclaims. "Did he say where to meet him?"

"Yes, in a set of destroyed ruins, a few minutes away from Urbus," Al adds.

"Look, if the meeting point is there, Elina must at the very least be nearby," Aeri reasons. "I say screw the money, we should go get her back ourselves."

Aeri's point makes some sense, but doing so would mean risking Elina's life. There is no humanly way possible to get that amount of Col on such short notice.

"Alright…let's do that," Al mutters.

"Wait, what? You do know we would be risking Eli's life, right?" I say.

Al nods and gives me a wide smirk as he picks up his blade from the floor. That really wicked smile of Aeri's quickly takes over her face. Well, at the very least, these two understand each other through violence. I sigh loudly and place my palm on my forehead.

"Are you two absolutely sure about this?" I ask. "This whole idea of yours might as well turn you into red players."

"I don't care as long as we get Elina back," Al grunts.

Aeri nods along with him and looks at me.

"She is special to you, huh?" I ask.

"We've shared a lot…I'll say that much," he says.

Aeri's expression turns to a heartwarming one as she places her hand on Al's shoulder.

"Don't worry, we'll get her back," she says, "I promise."

I notice Al smile a little and he chuckles a bit.

"You bet we will," I say to help the mood a little.

We get off the roof and return to the inn in order to get my armor and weapon back. I quickly change and meet with Al and Aeri who are sitting at a table with a familiar figure.

"Argo?"

She lifts her head and smiles at me.

"The word is that your friend fell into some kind of misfortune," she says.

"Hell…does news really get around that fast?" I ask.

She nods politely and smiles.

"I'm willing to lend a hand," she adds.

I smile and sit at the table they are having their little meet up at.

"So, what's the plan?"

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/27/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

As always, if you like what you read, please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Hostage"


	9. Chapter 9 - Hostage

**Chapter 9 - Hostage**

**December/5th/2022 - 1:20 AM**

**Alshep**

I can feel the cold dirt beneath my stomach. It feels weird, yet pleasant for some reason. I'm not exactly comfortable, but it isn't half bad either. It's rather hard to explain.

"What am I supposed to do again?"

I sigh to myself, this is not the place for the kind of chatter she just happens to spill out of her mouth. This is serious and there's a life on the line.

"You just tag along with me while Daath distracts the guys near the entrance," I reply.

Aeri nods and stares towards the ruins not far in front of us. She is lying next to me. We have decided to make a silent approach from one of the sides of the ruins. Mostly unguarded, the place is just a few minutes away from Urbus. Klaus asked me for money and in exchange, we would get Elina back.

"She really does mean a lot for you, huh?" she asks softly.

I breathe in deeply and hold my breath a little before answering.

"Yes, she does. We've spent a lot of time together and we know a lot about each other, and I'll be damned if I let anyone hurt her," I reply.

"Is this at all romantic?" Aeri says.

"The most inappropriate shit comes out of your mouth every time the situation is serious," I say. "She is just the closest friend I have as of now, and I've promised her too much. These promises are on the line today. I will get her back."

Aeri's face for the first time in quite a long while shows an expression that without the need of words tells me she is taking this seriously. This pleases me and for some reason puts me at ease.

"One last question," she mutters.

"Fine…what is it?" I answer.

She turns her head towards me and rests her chin on her palm.

"What did you promise her? Tell me one promise," she asks with a small smile.

I know for a fact she won't back down if I refuse to answer. I made a few promises to Elina. Off the top of my head, I remember a few. I would try my best to enjoy life here, no matter how hard it could be. I would eat at the very least once a day. I would try to tone down my grumpy attitude, and the most important of them all.

"I promised her she would live to see the end of this game."

Aeri smiles widely and pats my shoulder. I feel her expression is genuine and smile a bit before returning my sight to the ruins.

All the time I have been laying on the ground, I have not been able to get one thought out of my head. What if she is dead already? I have just a horrible feeling dwelling all over my body. The uncertainty of not knowing whether I'm going to see her again or not is killing me. I did not have her as a party member before she was abducted so I have no way of knowing if she is still alive. I have an awful knot in my throat that just kept tightening up as time passes. The only way I will be able to know if she is alive if things take a turn for the worse is by visiting that monument back at Starting City. There is no way I'm doing that before looking for her myself.

Daath is nice enough to snap me out of my thoughts as he kneels down close to my left side. He looks calm and collected. Hell, he always looks like that. If I admire something about him is how he is able to keep his cool at any time. Except for that one time with the so called beater.

"Ok…are you guys sure you want to do this?" he asks.

Aeri and I nod slowly.

"Alright. Remember, try to avoid hurting these players. You have a minimum of two strikes if you choose to engage in combat. By simply attacking them your cursor will turn orange for a while. More attacks than those two and you will immediately turn your cursor into a permanent orange," he says quietly. "If you want the get your ticket punched even faster, you'll have to kill one of them. Although I hope none of you are striving for that."

"It is a risk I'm willing to take. If Klaus hurt her, he'll have to answer to me," I murmur.

Daath breathes out and puts his hand on my shoulder.

"I know you want to hurt him badly right now, but it isn't worth it, man," he explains. "Let's just get Elina and get out."

"You are seriously saying it as if it were going to be easy," Aeri mumbles.

"If what Argo told us is true? There should only be five snakes here, including Klaus," he answers.

"Can we really trust this friend of yours?" I question.

"I trust her with my life," he says.

I have not met this woman Argo before, but apparently she is an information broker and a close friend of Daath. I have no reasons to trust her, other than the fact that she supplied us with the information that pointed us to what seems to be the place where Elina is being held up.

For all I know, Argo could be with The White Snakes and this is nothing but an elaborate trap to get back at me. However, given how close I am to possible death, I guess I got no other choice but to trust her.

"When do we start then?" Aeri asks.

"Now. I'll get into position and once I distract the three guys at the entrance, you two make haste and go inside," he says, "Once you're in, there should only be one other guy and Klaus. Please… try your best no to kill them or get yourselves killed, alright?"

"Aye, aye, chief," I say, trying to lighten the mood a little.

I can hear Aeri giggle a bit and Daath smiles as he gets up. He soon disappears behind us. Aeri and I carefully watch the guys at the entrance. Three blokes dressed in white eating something near a camp fire they set near some barrels.

"There he is," Aeri whispers while pointing towards the three guys.

Daath is walking up the main road to the ruins. If I didn't know him, I would guess he was doing something stupid, but he doesn't do stuff without thinking it through. While his move seems dangerous, I know for sure he's got something up his sleeve. He stops for a brief moment and bends over as if he was picking something up from the floor.

He straightens back up and tosses what looks like a rock into the air and catches it with his fist as it comes down. His hand suddenly glows blue and even from far away I can see him smiling.

An audible "huh?" can be heard from the guys guarding the ruins. They stand up and stand next to each other as they stare into what I assume they can only see as a blue flash of light. Daath places his hand behind his head and skips towards the guys a little. He moves swiftly in a straight line and suddenly stops as he moves his upper body forwards. Just like a baseball pitcher would do.

I hear a faint whirring noise and see a line of blue light quickly close distance to the entrance as it hits one of the guard right on his face. The impact knocks him back and his friends draw their weapons.

"Haha, I didn't know you could use skills on rocks," Aeri laughs.

"Me neither, I swear that guy just doesn't cease to impress me."

Daath quickly starts getting some distance from the ruins as the three guards blindly follow him into the darkness of the night.

"We are up, let's go," Aeri says before dashing towards the ruins.

I get on my feet quickly and follow her as I draw my sword. She hits the wall with her back and stops to look around as I reach her. I stick to the wall as well and she finally decides to draw her sword. She looks at me and I nod. She nods as well and starts walking slowly to reach the corner of the wall. As we shuffle along the wall, the light from the fire makes things a little more visible. I tighten the grip on my sword as I feel I'm getting closer to Klaus. I just want to bash his head in. Sadly this game doesn't really have any gore. So whatever this comes down to will have to suffice.

We reach the end of the wall and Aeri peeks quickly and hides away.

"It looks clear," she whispers.

I nod at her and she goes around the corner and hugs the wall as she gets closer to the entrance. I get off the wall for a bit and walk over to the fire to extinguish it, it's lighting up the area too much light and the last thing I want is for someone to spot us from far away. I quickly kick the logs away from each other and step on the little flames as they start get dimmer and dimmer.

As the last little flame is about to go out, I notice something shine in a blue-ish hue near the ground. I kneel quickly and brush some dirt off the top of the object.

"What are you doing? We need to go in now," Aeri grunts.

I pick up the object and finally notice it's the Azure Buckler I gave Elina as a gift not too long ago. A sudden surge of rage runs wildly through my body as I tuck it away in my inventory. I use my sword as a support to get quickly off my knees and walk quickly over to the ruins entrance. Aeri tries to grab my arm, but I brush it away as I walk inside the dark structure.

"Don't do this idiot. Don't act on impulse," she says as she puts her arms around my waist, successfully stopping me.

"I am going to kill him," I huff out.

"Look if you go in there without thinking about it you'll probably get her killed," she says.

I stop struggling and lower my blade a little. She can be quite on the spot sometimes. As long as she is not talking nonsense that is. I grab her hands and pull them away from me as I turn to face her.

"What do you suggest then?" I say.

She smiles and giggles a little as she walks past me. My whole body tells me that particular set of actions together cannot mean anything good.

"Just follow my lead, big guy," she says.

"This kind of crap you try to pull off sometimes…I really despise it," I complain.

She laughs again, now on a lower voice and gets close to the wall as we are about to reach a corridor with some kind of light shining from the end of it. A shadow coming from the other end of it becomes visible and we stop immediately to assess our next move.

"You think that's the other guy or is it Klaus?" I whisper.

Aeri shrugs and reaches the end of the wall. She peeks quickly and then with a fast turn she places her back on the other side of the corridor. She now stands next to me but across from where the light is shining off. She looks at me and makes some hands gestures. Something I might be able to understand if I remotely knew what the fuck she is trying to say.

"What?"

She places her palm on her forehead and closes her eyes. It is not my fault I didn't take the signing class before the operation, you stupid girl. She slides down the wall until she is almost sitting and proceeds to knock on the wall loudly. This takes me by surprise and the sudden impulse of hitting her for giving us away comes to mind. She stares at me fiercely and lifts three of her fingers up.

Looking at the light coming deep from the corridors I see as the shadow becomes smaller. Whoever is on the other side is getting close. I get closer to the wall, almost wishing the thing had a little room I could hide in. Aeri now holds two fingers up and is mouthing something. The tension of the moment makes me realize she is counting down something. The tip of a spear suddenly becomes visible from inside the corridor and Aeri drops down another finger. She shuffles towards me still on the floor and mouths the word "now" slowly.

Not really knowing what she wanted me to do, I tackle the spear wielding guy who is now positioned next to Aeri. As I'm pushing his upper body, Aeri stops his legs from being able to walk back. This helps me knock him down easily and Aeri quickly gets away from behind him as he falls. As our bodies hit the ground, I punch the man in the face. Aeri quickly shoves me away and places herself on top of the man, putting her hands over his mouth to prevent him from screaming.

"Go now, I got this, ok?" she says.

I nod and kick away the man's spear to stop him from trying to reach it. With my sword in hand, I walk down the corridor that has some torches lighting it up. There's a door at the end of the corridor, carefully I approach the door and place my ear on it. I do not have a high eavesdropping level, Daath calls it straining, but it is decent enough to let me hear some stuff through the not-so-thick door.

I am able to hear someone crying. It is definitely Elina. I've heard her enough times with her voice wrapped like that that it is easy for me to recognize. I am about to kick the door in when Aeri's words come back to mind.

I place my free hand on the knob and turn it slowly. I push the door open a little and I'm able to see into the room through the small opening I just made. It's just enough to let me see Elina kneeling on the floor with her arms tied behind her back and her mouth covered with some kind of cloth. Tears are flowing out of her eyes and she doesn't stop crying. Her armor is damaged and her face has some dirt on it. I am doing my best to hold back that urge to burst inside and kill Klaus, but then, our eyes meet.

Elina stops crying and she opens her eyes widely. I can already see her smile, even with the piece of cloth preventing her from showing me.

"Did you finally stop feeling sorry for yourself?" says a male voice.

Klaus slowly comes into the picture and blocks my view of Elina. All I can see is his back.

"Did you finally accept the fact that you are going to die?" he continues. "Just a few more hours and if I don't get what I want…your pretty head is coming off."

I open the door some more, I do this slowly while trying not to get the freaking thing to creak as I do so. I can hear Elina trying to say something but her voice is muffled.

"What? Are you actually going to make other noises other than crying now?" Klaus says.

The opening in the door is not big enough yet for me to slip in. I keep opening the door bit by bit until there is enough space for me to come in without making much noise. Klaus gets closer to Elina and I feel the need to get the door open faster. He bends over and gets even closer to her.

Elina's muffled voice suddenly is replaced by a loud gasp and then the sound of her breathing in deeply.

"I am not going to die!" she yells.

The gap is finally big enough for me to step in. I do so slowly and finally get inside the room.

"You sound so sure little girl," Klaus mocks. "What makes you think your friends are even thinking of coming here? For all you know, they will not even bother in trying to get the money."

Never in my life had I ever felt so slow, but I need to move slowly I don't want to make too much noise or do something stupid. The few seconds it takes me to move from the door to a few feet away from Klaus feel like minutes.

"Because I know they would do anything to save me, just like I would do for them," says Elina.

Klaus starts laughing loudly and pulls Elina up on her feet from her hair. Elina screams and struggles to get on her feet. Already liking the idea of killing, I ready my sword and point it towards Klaus.

"Face it, bitch! They already left you for dead!" Klaus spits out.

"That's…where y-you are wrong," Elina says while looking at me.

Without thinking about it, I activate a sword skill, the almost pitch black room lights up with a shiny red glow and the whirring sound becomes louder.

"You?!" Klaus huffs.

"That's right, you fucking bastard," I reply.

I let go and cut the distance between him and me. He lets go of Elina and rolls back avoiding my attack. He steps back and runs towards the door. I immediately kneel down and cut Elina free.

"Al, you are here."

I grin a bit and hand over her buckler. She smiles and places it over her hand.

"You really have the balls to come directly at me?" Klaus says furiously.

He grabs his oddly shaped sword and charges a sword skill as he stares me down.

"Why do you always ask these stupid questions?" I say as I get Elina on her feet, "I am here, no? So then the answer is yes, now isn't, idiot?"

He makes a grunting noise and dashes to attack Elina, with little-to-no time to react I jump in front of her. His sword drives cleanly through me. I grunt at the sudden weird feeling and drop my sword. My HP is less than eighty points away from reaching zero.

"Al!" Elina screams.

His attack is critical and what little I have of health left slowly starts to drain since the sword is still piercing me. I push Klaus away and quickly pull his sword out my chest. I throw it blindly and it lands a few steps away from him. Looking down, I'm able to see the bright damage effect still on my chest. I reach for my sword and hear the sound of the sword skill ready to go off.

"Now you've really done it," I say.

Klaus nervously tries to get to his sword, but I quick step towards him and attack him. My blow sends him flying across the room and he destroys a few barrels he crashes into. I see the glow on the edge of my eye. I raise my sword, the bright red light clouds my vision as I walk towards the destroyed barrels. I see his pathetic figure moving around trying to get up and I can't help but to smile. As I get closer, he starts crawling back into the wall.

"No! No! We can talk about this wait!" He cries.

"Hah, the only sound you are going to make is crying as I cut your pretty little head off," I say.

I let go again and close in on him fast.

"Don't!" screams Elina.

She jumps in from the side and with her buckler deflects my sword. The impact of my sword with her buckler makes a blue effect spark out. My sword then impacts the wall next to Klaus's face and shatters into pieces. The sword's slick gray color turns to red and sharp pieces of it go flying everywhere. I cover my eyes and shield my face a bit. Klaus kicks me away and runs for the door. I try to get up quickly and give him chase but as I try to get up I slip and fall on my knees.

Trying to get up again I feel something pulling me back. I turn to see Elina holding my foot with her face to the ground. I stop and kneel on the spot.

"Elina…why?" I mutter.

She doesn't say anything but sits up as well. I find myself without breath as I see her face. Some of the pieces that shattered from my blade are still glowing red as they are embedded into her face. Her eyes start tearing up, I get close to her and hold her chin gently.

"My f-face feels way too warm…" she mumbles.

I softly try to remove the sharp chunks of steel of her face. She twitches as I try to pick them out.

"It doesn't…it doesn't feel good," she says as she tries to hold back her tears.

As I pull the pieces off I can see the damage effect glow beneath each piece of them. Well, I'll be damned if this game isn't fucking precise.

"Are your health points ok?" I ask.

She nods and moves her face a bit, but I hold her steady as I keep removing the shattered blade.

"I didn't want you to kill anyone…I'm sorry…I-I even br-broke your sword," she says.

"Don't say something like that, it was just a sword. I can get a new one," I whisper. "But your face, that I can't get a replacement of."

She laughs a little but stops quickly as I pull a large chunk out.

"I'm so sorry Eli…" I mutter as I pull out the last piece.

I let go of her chin and she lifts her hands to touch her face.

"Something still feels warm…near here," she says as she rubs near her neck.

I tilt her head a little to the right and see a big piece of the sword buried in the part between her shoulder and the nape of her neck. It's way too big.

"Is there a still piece there? My health points are still going down really really slowly," she says.

"Yeah, er, I'll try to pull this one out ok?" I say. "Try not to move."

She nods and tilts her head a little more so I can get a view of the large chunk. I place my fingers on it and start pulling it. The piece doesn't move and I end up pulling on Elina more than I do on the piece of broken sword.

"It won't move…I don't get it," I exclaim, "ok...uhm, hold on a bit."

I get on my feet and place my left hand on her shoulder and my right hand grabbing the shattered piece.

"Ok...uh, grab unto my leg, ok?"

"What?" she replies.

"Just do it, this one is in deep apparently," I say.

She holds my leg close and I start pulling on the chunk. She complains a little and with one forceful pull I manage to take out the almost five centimeter long piece off her neck. I toss it away and help her on her feet.

"Al! Eli! Are you guys ok!?" Aeri shouts as she runs into the room.

She sees us and her face lightens up with a smile.

"Oh thank god you guys are ok! I saw Al's health go down quickly and I freaked out. Then that Klaus dude came out running," she explains.

"We are ok," Elina says softly as she smiles.

We all brighten up and Aeri tosses me a potion. I catch and quickly drink it down. My health points go up steadily and I pick up what's left of my broken sword. I put it in my inventory and stretch a little.

"Is Daath ok?" Elina asks.

Aeri nods and opens a message.

"He says he managed to lose the guys when they were almost getting to Urbus," she says. "Although, he says we should meet back at Tolbana."

"Makes sense. I guess it's only dangerous to be up here right now," I say.

Elina nods and I scratch my head before letting out a big sigh.

"It is a long walk," Aeri sighs.

I chuckle a bit and so does Elina.

"Then we should get going," Elina says.

We make our way out of the ruins and start heading to Urbus so we can take the Gate down to Starting City. Aeri gets a little head start on me and, Elina. She walks quite a bit far from us.

"Thanks, Al," Elina says quietly.

"No problem," I say with a smile.

She smiles back at me and turns her head to the road. We keep walking for a bit and Urbus becomes bigger as we approach it. Suddenly, I feel Elina's hand prodding my side. She prods me again and opens her palm.

"Heh, you can talk. You know that right?" I tease.

I open my hand and hold hers. It's been a month now, but I'm finally realizing life here really can't be that bad.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/29/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

I would like to thank all of you guys who have followed and faved this story it really means a lot. As always if you like what you read, please leave a review!

Wanna see some sketches of our characters? Of course you do. Go down to my profile to find them, tell me what you think.

Thank you for reading!

Next chapter: "Where We Stand"


	10. Chapter 10 - Where We Stand

**Chapter 10 - Where We Stand**

**December/17th/2022**

**Alshep**

"Would you please stop moving so much?"

"Oh shut it, fatso. It's your fault that we are stuck here anyways."

"What is it with you and my appearance? I'm seriously not that fat."

"Well, Daath is skinnier than you, so that by default makes you the fat one of the group."

"Screw yo- god dammit stop moving!"

"No, You sto- ahhh!"

We make a loud thud as we reach the bottom of the crevasse. The game's system does not allow us to feel pain, but I can't help to grunt and complain as my back hits the ground and then Aeri falls right on my stomach. Aeri rolls off of me also complaining as if the fall really had hurt her.

Ever since we fell into the opening, I knew this wasn't going to end well. The fall at first was wide, we fell for about five meters before it started to get narrow. To the point we got stuck between the walls. All the tossing and nudging around must've made what was left of the wall loose and then made us fall into some sort of cave.

"I'm almost down to half of my HP," Aeri mutters. "This is all your damn fault!"

"Yeah, of course it is. You were totally watching where you were going and you totally did not pull me along with you when you started falling," I mumble.

She hisses at me and turns her head away as she stands up. I get on my feet as well and look around. A thick darkness surrounds me and Aeri. A long beam of light pierces through the crevasse all the way down making it the only source of light within what I can only assume is a cave.

Aeri fumbles a bit around her pockets and takes out a lantern. She lights it up and holds it a little in front of her making the darkness go away as the light burns through it.

"Well, at the very least you have increased your usefulness." I tease.

"Har har, at the very least you've toned down your insults," she replies.

"It's more like I am censoring myself. I still meant the insult."

She changes her expression to a blank one and starts walking around the area. I stay in the same spot where I stood up and look directly above me. I can see the sun shining and I see an eagle flying by through the narrow space in the fissure.

"Hey, look. It looks like a path," Aeri says.

I turn around and see her pointing down a tunnel a few feet away from me.

"Is that safe?" I ponder.

"Well, there's no other way out of this place."

"That doesn't answer my question at all," I reply.

"I wasn't trying to answer your question," she says with a smile.

"Fine, fine, but don't go whining if it isn't the right wa-"

I interrupt myself as I hear the scream of a girl followed by a loud thud behind me. I turn around quickly unsheathe my rapier and Aeri quickly moves next to me with her sword at hand.

"Oh dear, that was a horrible idea," says the girl sitting on the floor.

Aeri and I both stand at ease a little but keep our weapons ready, just in case. She stands up and dusts off her skirt and shoulders. She breathes in deeply and looks directly at us. Her hair is almost golden, a pretty strong tone of blonde and is tied up in a fancy way as it hangs from behind her head. She wears a white skirt and a grayish top with a shoulder plate. It looks somewhat odd but it somehow fits. A rapier hangs from her side, but hers is unbelievably thin almost resembles a fencing sword.

"Excuse me," she says with a soft voice, "did you two fall down here as well?"

"Well, that is pretty darn obvi-"

Aeri places her free hand over my mouth, stopping me from completing my sentence. She frowns at me, but I know exactly what she is trying to say. Shut the hell up.

"Yeah, we did," Aeri replies.

"I was not looking where I was headed and in a horrible twist of fate, I stumbled into this horrendous pit," she responds.

"Crevasse…" I mutter to myself.

"Where are my manners, my name is Kayla. It is nice to make your acquaintance uhm…"

"Aeri, and this big guy here is Al," she says while patting my back.

"You are serious mess of mood swings, you know that, right?" I mutter.

"Splendid," Kayla says. "Do you happen to know the way out of here?"

She says this and holds her hands close to her chest. Her mannerisms strike me as a little odd, somewhat princess-like. Almost as if she was raised like one, which is kind of funny since I only expect to see this kind of behavior in a tv show or some work of fiction. It is entertaining for some reason.

"We were just about to head down that path," I say while pointing to the tunnel.

Kayla presses her index finger against her lips and seems to think for a bit.

"Why are you two pointing at me with your weapons?" she says. "Am I an unwanted presence?"

I just notice I am indeed pointing my rapier at her. Aeri seems to notice as well and sheathes her sword rather quickly. I do the same and clear my throat.

"Just a precaution," I say.

"You mustn't judge a book by its cover," she says.

"Safer to always do the opposite," I whisper to myself.

I nod slowly and scratch my head a little. Kayla approaches me and Aeri slowly, I notice Aeri reaching for the back of her head and see her open her hand as it gets closer to the grip of her sword. I guess she is just nervous.

Kayla is soon enough in front of us and Aeri slowly relaxes her hand and lets it drop to her side.

"Your friend doesn't seem to trust me much," Kayla comments.

"Well, I don't either. After all, we just introduced ourselves," I say.

"My my, you are rather harsh."

"That's just the way he is, stick around long enough and you might even get to know the uneducated animal he is," Aeri mocks.

"Oh goodness, do you speak like that often?" Kayla mumbles.

I chuckle a bit and turn my back on Aeri and Kayla.

"I like you," I say as I walk to the tunnel.

Just as I approach the tunnel I notice something that feels really off. There is an eerie lack of background music in this area. Complete and utter silence aside from my steps and the voices of Aeri and Kayla discussing something not far from me is all I can hear.

"Hey Aeri, mind if I borrow that lantern of yours?"

"Be my guest," she says as she tosses it my way.

I catch and smile to myself because I'm sure I looked pretty cool doing so. I rest my right arm just above the opening of the tunnel and bend over to peek in with the lantern on my left hand. The light doesn't help me much, I can only see a few feet into the damn thing. My whole body is screaming that it is a bad idea to even think of going in, but a quick look around reminds me that it is the only path available.

Kayla and Aeri catch up to me and they giggle as I turn to face them.

"You two besties already or what?"

"None of your business Al," Aeri snaps.

"It's rude to keep someone out of the loop. Just throwing that out there," I huff.

"Is this the tunnel you spoke of?" Kayla asks as she leans to see down the tunnel.

I nod and she straightens up. Something about her is just attracting, I don't know if it is the strong yellow tone of her hair or just her figure. She is rather good looking, maybe even prettier than Aeri. My mind is going off track.

"We gain nothing if we stand here like idiots," Aeri says as she slips in between me and Kayla.

She crouches and starts making her way inside the tunnel.

"Shit," she shouts.

"Lantern?" I say smugly

"Just give it to me," she demands.

She sticks her hand out of the tunnel and I put the lantern on her palm. She proceeds to go back inside and goes in a little farther. Kayla looks at me and chuckles a bit.

"She isn't the brightest tool in the shed," I joke.

Kayla laughs a bit and crouches as well to start making her way into the tunnel.

"It gets a little narrow farther ahead," Aeri shouts.

Her voice echoes as it comes out on my end.

"Good luck, Al," she says laughing.

I sigh and bend my knees to get a view of the tunnel. I can see a faint light in-front of Kayla. Aeri really worked her way in fast. I start making little steps, little by little treading my hand on the left wall to keep my balance. Kayla suddenly stops and gets on her knees and hands. Giving me a rather lovely view of her bottom, I can't help but to smile. This smile is quickly erased as she kicks me hard in the face.

"What the hell was that for?!" I yell.

"I guess your partner was right," she mutters.

"Hey look, it isn't my fault you just bent over."

"You could be a gentleman and look the other way," she replies.

"Forget it, I'm sorry. Just keep moving alright? I'll mind my own business."

She "hmph"s me just like Aeri does and keeps crawling in. I'm a man of my word so I get on my knees and hands and look down to my hands as I place one in-front of the other to make my way through the narrow path.

"It widens a little over here," I hear Aeri say.

We keep crawling for a bit and I finally reach the part Aeri said. I get on my toes and press my hands on the wall as I keep moving.

"Do you mind if I ask a few questions about you two?" Kayla says.

"I don't see why not," Aeri says.

"Shoot," I reply.

"How long have you been together?" Kayla says as she moves around in-front of me.

"Woah, woah! We are not together," Aeri says quickly.

"She means as in a group idiot, not a couple," I comment.

"Oh, ok, how long has it been? A few weeks, right?"

"Yeah. Kind of hard to pinpoint though," I say.

"We are party members with another two," Aeri replies.

"A guy named Daath and another girl, Elina," I say.

Aeri starts laughing a little.

"Girl is a harsh way to refer to your girlfriend, don't you think?" she chuckles.

"Oh, you have a girlfriend Al?" Kayla curiously asks.

"She is not my girlfriend…we…we just enjoy each other's company."

"Call it whatever you want, you know it to be true," Aeri teases.

"Just shut up and keep moving," I grunt.

She and Kayla laugh a bit as they pick up the pace. I wouldn't exactly call the relationship me and Elina have as boyfriend and girlfriend. I mean, sure. We care about each other a lot and spend a ton of time together. The more I think about it, the more I feel embarrassed and decide to drop the topic myself.

"Woohoo! An exit," Aeri shouts

"Finally," Kayla sighs.

It's not long before Kayla exits the tunnel with me behind her and we find ourselves on another large room with no light at all, but a little more scanning around reveals an exit. I stand up and stretch, a yawn slowly escapes me as well. I stare at the exit for a little and ponder in my thoughts.

"This is definitely a trap," Kayla mutters.

"Yup," I agree quickly.

"Why would this be a trap? We can leave now. The exit is right there!" Aeri complains.

Kayla chuckles a bit and takes out her sword and swipes it down as she rests her free hand on her hip.

"Exactly my dear, it is just right there. This is obviously a trap," she answers.

I look up and notice something moving, a sharp goose bump goes through my spine and I extend my hand to Aeri.

"Lantern, please."

She quickly hands it over and I get ready to throw it upwards but stop myself.

"By any chance do you happen to have an extra one of these?" I ask Aeri.

She shakes her head and shrugs.

"I have a lantern," Kayla quickly adds.

"Good," I say and throw the lantern upwards.

Another goose bump goes through me as the lantern lights its way up and reveals the biggest snake I had ever seen in my life. Its eyes shine red and it hisses at us loudly.

"Let's have some fun then," Aeri says as she takes out her sword.

"You two are honestly an odd pair," Kayla says softly.

"Stick around, you'll have some fun," I say.

I take out my sword and the lantern crashes against the floor. To my surprise it doesn't go out but instead lights up different trails of something flammable on the ground. Fire rises from the ground separating me from Kayla and Aeri. I can feel the warmth and suddenly feel motivated as some background music kicks in. I hear Aeri laugh loudly and see the snake slither its way down the wall closest to Kayla's and Aeri's side.

I see Aeri jump high and attack the snake from where I'm standing. It slithers away quickly and heads towards me at full speed. I ready my sword as it shines bright blue. Just as its a few feet away from me I attack it while shouting out of the top of my lungs. I manage to connect and do some damage, but it quickly cowers away and turns around to head towards the girls again.

"It's going your way again!" I shout.

Through the fire I manage to see Kayla attacking the side of the massive slithering creature as it passes next to her. The snake shakes its tail and manages to hit Kayla pushing her close to the fire. She loses her balance and is about to fall right in the fire but I move quickly and push her away as I dive through the flames. I roll once I'm on the other side and stand up quickly.

My vest catches fire, but I quickly swat it away and help Kayla on her feet.

"It's on the ceiling again!" Aeri yells.

I glance up and see it moving right over me and it then quickly descends the wall behind me. Aeri and Kayla both ready a sword skill. Aeri's sword shines yellow and Kayla's a weird pink-ish color.

"Al! Launch me up!"Aeri orders.

"What?"

"Just do it!"

I bend one knee and hold my hands together as Aeri starts running towards me. She makes a small jump and places one foot on my hands. I lift her up and send her into the air as she holds her sword with both of her hands. She moves the tip of her sword downwards and begins her drop into the snakes back. I roll forwards just barely avoiding the snake's head and see Aeri drive her sword on the snake's body. She holds on tight and rides the snake while hanging on to her sword.

"She is fearless," Kayla comments.

"Haha, and a little crazy," I add.

The snake goes around the room as Aeri pulls and pushes her sword on its back making great amounts of damage.

"Hey…do the same with me, please," Kayla mumbles.

"You sure?" I come back.

She nods steadily and I nod back.

"Ok, but wait till it turns around."

She gets ready by making some distance between me and her and I look back trying to position myself for her to jump on the snake. Aeri keeps attacking the thing like a savage and I can hear her laugh from across the room. The snake jerks its body towards us and starts moving. I bend one knee again and make the little platform with my hands. I nod at Kayla and she starts running towards me. She jumps into my hands and I throw her up. She lands closer to the head and pushes her sword through the reptile.

I find myself surprised as I haven't dealt much damage to the beast like my companions have. I start running alongside its body and jump on it sword first. My sword gets stuck right on the last section of the snake's tail and it pulls on me violently as I try to hang on. I begin to lose my grip and it suddenly shakes me off its body with my sword still impaled on the tail.

"Shit," I grunt as I roll near one of the walls of fire.

The snake turns around quickly and sees me. I can see it on its eyes. It's coming for me. It hisses violently and moves quickly to me. Just as it's about to reach me Kayla reaches the head and stabs it hard. This makes the snake close its eyes and shake in pain. With the tip of its mouth it knocks me to the ground and depletes a bit of my health. With its eyes closed it crashes against the wall and stops moving.

"Pummel it! Hit it with everything!" I shout.

Not a second passes and I hear the damage effects along with Kayla's and Aeri's swords whirr. I get up and run to the snake's tail. I find my sword exactly where I left it and run over the tail. Just as I'm passing by I grab my sword's grip and start dragging it with me without letting it go out of the snake. I start going faster and my sword just glides over the snake's skin. We are close to killing it, its HP barely has ten percent left. Like cutting butter my sword finally reaches to where Kayla is stabbing the beast. I pull it out and Kayla's sword flashes. She drives her sword in and the snake's body turns into light.

We drop a couple of feet and I land on my feet, so does Aeri but Kayla stumbles a bit. I sheathe my sword along with everyone. The fire slowly disappears and the result screens pop up.

"Well, that was a crappy enemy," Aeri says.

"Yeah, it barely attacked us," I say.

Kayla stands up and the thin rapier on her hand turns into a green two handed sword. The weight makes her body move forwards and she struggles to lift it up again.

"You got that cause of the last hit?" I ask.

"I would assume so. It is not my kind of weapon though," she replies.

"If you don't want it, can I keep it?" I request.

She nods and hands the weapon over to me and accepts the trade. I equip it instead of my rapier and lift it with one hand up in the air. Now this feels nice, while it's incredibly heavy. It feels much better than that flimsy rapier. Thankfully its sheath is still set on my hip so I can still maintain my usual sheathing and unsheathing style. A little picky to be honest but I am pleased nonetheless.

"Well time to get out of here," Aeri says as she slaps the back of my head.

"What was that for?!" I scream. "Geez, I hope you two don't become fond of hitting me."

Kayla quickly hides her face and blushes a bit. I think she is reminiscing of the thing that went on inside the tunnel.

"I'm sorry for kicking you, but I had to do it. I know you were staring," she says.

"For god's sake Al! You have a girlfriend and you are staring at other women's butts. Shame on you!" Aeri says.

"She is not my girlfriend!"

Both of the girls start laughing at me and I just walk towards the exit trying to get away from them. The sun shines brightly over the second floor of Aincrad. Just a few days ago the clearing party managed to beat the floor boss. That's an amazing record time to be honest, compared to the time it took us to beat the first one that is. Very few people stayed in Urbus, all the others ventured forth to the third floor. I've heard so far it's like a big forest, but I rather see it myself.

I take a small step forward and the floor collapses under my foot. The exit seems to be located just on the side of the mountain we were trying to go up to before falling in the crevasse. Quickly regaining my balance I manage to stay where I'm standing. Looking down makes it look like a long drop, but the fall isn't vertical. It's more like a big and long slope. I definitely wouldn't want to go rolling down this thing.

"Well, that's odd. You can see Urbus from here," Aeri says as she stands next to me.

"Are you two staying in Urbus right now?" Kayla asks.

"As of now, yes, but we'll be moving to the next floor tomorrow," I add.

She presses her finger against her lip again. Aeri stretches and yawns loudly as she tests the edge of the exit as well. Some dirt loosens up and falls too so she stands back a little.

"Can I request something?" Kayla mumbles.

I peek down again and scan around a little for a way down of the mountain.

"Well…go ahead," I reply.

"Would you be so kind as to let me join your group?"

Aeri stares quickly at me with a face I know means no. I know that both she and Daath agree to disagree in this topic. They both say it would be a burden to have more people along. That our group like it is right now is ok, but while they are right when saying it could burden us, I don't see why a girl that knows her way around with a sword could harm us.

"We'll have to discuss that with everyone else. I don't see why you can't join," I say.

Aeri slowly walks behind me and takes out her sword. She stabs the ground behind me and an unnerving sensation brews under my feet. The ground breaks under me and I start sliding down the mountain. I hit more than a few rocks on my way down and finally land on my face when reaching the bottom. Soon enough Aeri comes down gracefully sliding on her feet and kicks me over.

"Are you stupid?! We don't need another person!" she yells at me.

"Aren't ya the hypocritical bitch?" I yell back. "We took you in remember?!"

She kicks me again and I stand up. I grab her hand tightly as she is about to slap me.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"You are just going to complicate things!" she replies.

I hold her other hand as it flies to my face and stop it too.

"If anything, it'll make things easier. What are you talking about?"

"You'll just make things harder on Daa-" she stops herself.

"Huh?" I mutter.

She stops struggling and returns her hands to her side. She looks down and starts walking away in the general direction of Urbus.

"Did I upset her?" says Kayla as she comes down sliding from behind me.

"No, she is just weird…" I sigh, "Anyway, are you coming along?"

She nods and I start walking with her.

"Sorry to pry on this, but I'm rather curious. Do you really have a girlfriend?"

"Well…I don't know to be honest. I like what I have with her right now, but I don't know if I want anything more…"

"Hmm, I see," she mutters.

"Was that all?"

"Yeah, it is just that your partner mentioned quite a bit. So naturally, I became curious," she says.

The walk takes a while, but we reach Urbus' main road before sundown. The whole way here I wasn't able to spot Aeri, she must've hauled ass here. The inn we are staying at isn't far from the main plaza. These streets used to be crowded just a few weeks ago, now they lie almost empty. It is just like they did when this floor was first opened, and before all the people came in to celebrate that is. It feels odd but good at the same time. We are moving on, this game isn't unbeatable. It will take time yes, but it isn't impossible. There is a way out of this death game and we are going to fight our way through it.

I'm about to open the door to then inn when Kayla stops me.

"Are you sure it's ok? I don't want to be a nuisance," she says.

"It'll be fine, you are good with your sword. If anything we need more people willing to engage in combat," I assure her.

I open the door slowly and see Aeri and Daath staring at me from a table close to the door. I walk over slowly and sit down. Kayla treads behind me slowly and sits beside me.

"You know where I stand in this Al," Daath says.

"What harm could one person do to us?"

"It's not about the harm, it's about the responsibility," he grunts. "I know you don't exactly care too much, but the simple fact of having to watch another back. It's mind breaking, man."

"Ok, the fact that I'm an ass most of the time doesn't mean I don't care. I care about you, I care about Elina, and as hard as this might be to believe I care about Aeri. We are a team, we are in this together," I answer.

Aeri looks at me and stares away quickly. Daath breathes in slowly and then exhales.

"Fine, I'm not exactly fond to the idea but…dammit fine," he huffs. "Ok, so what can you tell me about yourself?" he asks Kayla.

She flusters up all of the sudden and struggles to find words. I pat her back and tell her to calm down.

"My name is Kayla, I've been solo-ing since day one. To be honest it has been rather lonely and excruciatingly hard. I use light swords and consider myself very agile, although compared to your partner Aeri I would think I'm slow," she says, "It would really be an honor if you took me in. I'll try to help in anything I can and am able."

Daath smiles a bit and chuckles.

"I see you are a little nervous. Calm down, ok?" he comments. "I have my reasons for not being too eager with you joining, but I think I'll have to deal with it. We are partners now, I guess."

Kayla smiles and giggles a bit. I smile as well and lean back a little. Our group has a one plus again. Daath words suddenly make sense in my head, but the only thought that comes to mind is that perhaps he doesn't want to get too attached to more people. After all death is looming in every corner and the death of one of us wouldn't only lower morale but it could even break some of us down. I look at him and he is giving me the look he used to give me whenever I understood something he was teaching me. I guess he can read minds as well

I stand up from the table and start heading to the stairs of the inn.

"She is in her room, she said she was very tired," Daath says.

I freeze and can already hear Aeri giggling a bit.

"Alright, thanks," I say.

I make my way up and turn into the long hallway. I bring up my inventory to take my armor off and switch to some cotton pants and a gray shirt. It feels smooth and nice. Elina's door is just next to mine so it's easy for me to locate it. I knock on it a couple of times with no response. I stand in the hallway awkwardly waiting but nothing happens.

I try the knob and it slowly turns, a little surprised I creek the door in and see Elina curled up in her bed. As I'm closing the door to head to my room I hear her voice.

"Is that you?" she mumbles half asleep.

"Sorry, sorry, you go back to sleep."

"No…wait...come in," she says.

I go into the room and close the door behind me.

"Are you ok?" she asks.

I smile and nod. She smiles as well and sits up in bed.

"We have a new partner, see?" I say as I point upwards.

She looks up at her HUD and her expression appears bothered.

"Who is he?"

"She," I correct.

"Oh, I though Daath didn't want more people," she says.

"I kind of twisted his hand," I say while chuckling, "You didn't have any nightmares, right?"

She shakes her head slowly as I sit on the edge of the bed.

"Well that's good," I say while smiling.

* * *

**Later that night**

**Aeri**

"Are you really ok with the new girl?" I mumble while bending over the table.

Our leader sits across from me in the table as he finishes his drink.

"Aeri, you more than anyone knows exactly why I'm against it."

"Yeah…because you don't want to be responsible for more people…but…maybe if you didn't take the role of boss that often may-" Daath slams the table before I'm able to finish.

"What then, huh? Let Eli take the role? Al?" he raises his voice. "As cocky as this may sound, they aren't fit for the responsibilities. Al is too much of an impulsive animal and Eli is a frightened little girl."

"But what about me?" I mutter.

"You…you…shit. I'm sorry…" he says.

I look away and feel very sad for some reason.

"I just want to help you…the burden is not yours alone to carry," I say softly before standing up from my seat.

I start walking away from the table. Tears for some dumb reason start filling my eyes. I brush them away from my face. Since when am I so sentimental?

"Aeri, wait," he says while grabbing my shoulder from behind.

"You are right…but I've been thinking this way because no one ever offered help. I thought myself to be the only one able to keep us safe," he says, "but I am not… It is something we gotta work on together, it is something I'll need help with."

"What are you trying to say?" I answer trying to keep my voice from breaking.

"Help me," he whispers.

I can feel myself smiling and walk away from him a bit as I head to the stairs.

"Is that a yes?" he asks from afar.

I turn and nod at him with a smile.

"It's an effort we'll have to make together. As a team, no?" I say.

He smiles at me gently.

"As a team."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/29/2016

A big thank you to Donna Hufflepuff for Betareading this chapter!

Meet Kayla she will be another vital part of our little team. FUN FACT: In the first draft of this chapter Kayla was going to be a big burly man. It's funny how things change.

If you would like to see some sketches of our characters please visit my profile. If you've made it this far it means you have read about 50,000 words of my story, yay!

As always, if you like what you read please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Reminiscing"


	11. Chapter 11 - Reminiscing

**Chapter 11 - Reminiscing**

**November/6th/2022**

**Akari**

Two years, five months, and twelve days since it happened. Since then I find it hard to sleep even harder to wake up. Sometimes I don't even want to wake up.

"Akari! Wake up, I got a surprise for you!" says my sister from outside my room.

I cover my face up with the blankets in my bed and turn on my side slowly. Please go away dear sister, I beg you. She keeps on knocking and repeating my name. Wake up, wake up, surprise, surprise.

"I know you are awake, hehe. Can I come in? Pretty please?!"

I turn on my back and slowly remove the blanket from my face, the clock on my night-stand says it is still very early. Nine A.M. early to be exact. My sister has never been good when it comes to allowing people to sleep peacefully. I rub my eyes slowly and blink consciously a few times before sitting up.

"C-come in," I say in mid-yawn.

She pushes the door in with her back, carrying a small box. The surprise perhaps?

"Rise and shine! I have a surprise!" she says as she sits on my bed.

"Is today something special?" I ask.

"Not at all, I just so happen to buy something I think you'll really like."

I really admire my sister, even after all that has happened she still tries constantly to make me happy, or at the very least to make me feel a little better with myself. I thank her for everything she has done, but I sometimes think she shouldn't even bother. It is sad, yes, but I really think I'm not even worth the effort.

I have to constantly be a hypocrite when talking to her. I have to smile at her compliments, and say thank you for things she gives me that I didn't even ask for. She is such a good person and I'm just inconsiderate I guess.

"What did you buy, sis?"

She grins at me and turns to fiddle inside the box. She quickly turns around with a metallic helmet in her hands.

"TA-DAH!" she shouts.

"Shh, you are going to wake up mother," I whisper.

"Sorry…haha," she replies.

In her hands, she holds what looks like a big helmet. It has the letters NVG in the forehead area.

"What is this?" I say while taking the thing away from her.

"See, I knew you would be interested."

It feels heavy and cold, taking a closer look just underneath the letters NVG I see something written. Nervegear. It has some tiny led lights on the side close to the letters. POW, WAN, BLK.

"Is this thing like a new gadget for something?"

My sister stands up and twirls around on her foot.

"Close, but no. It's more like a controller thing."

"What do you mean by controller?"

She bends over a little and takes something else out of the box. A small box, almost the size of a dvd casing.

"It's the controller for…drum roll please!" she says and taps rapidly on her stomach. "This game!"

I place my finger over my lips and shrug a bit as she raised her voice. She apologizes and also puts her finger over her mouth. The box she is holding out reads SAO and under those letters "Sword Art Online".

"How do I control a game with a helmet?"

"Haha, I was expecting you to ask such question my dear and precious little sister," she says with a weird accent.

I shrug a bit at her name calling and can't help but to look down at the helmet feeling a bit embarrassed. She is just too good of a person.

"You see my dear little sister, you control this game with your brain. Full immersion virtual reality!" she yells.

"Sis, please, your voice," I say softly.

She shrugs and covers her mouth quickly. She can be very silly at times. Full immersion virtual reality, that kind of rings a bell. I guess I must have seen it somewhere when going around the internet.

"This game will kind of literally let you play with your brain in another body, does that make sense? Haha," she says.

I'm suddenly very interested and even use my hands to help me sit more comfortably.

"So…I would be able to do anything?" I ask.

"From what I have looked up about the game, yes. Pretty much everything."

I suddenly become very very interested. I place the helmet beside me and take away the casing from her hands. It has some info on the back and it says it requires a NerveGear system to work. I find odd that the word is written differently on the box than the helmet itself.

"I already installed the game for you. You just have to calibrate the helmet and you should be able to play it right away," she tells me with a smile on her face, "You sleep like a rock let me tell you that."

"Wait you came into my room while I was sleeping?" I ask, "And used my computer?"

"Kind of...?" she shrugs.

I smile back a little but do my best to erase said smile from my face. She just did something nice for me. Yet…deep inside me I just feel like I'm wasting her time. Or maybe the reason why I stopped smiling is because I sensed some pity in her actions. My emotions have been a serious mess lately, I really don't know what to think of myself or others lately.

I fiddle around for a few seconds with both the helmet and the casing, I feel pretty excited to be honest. Suddenly as I'm turning and moving the helmet around my sleeves drop a little from wrist. I don't notice at first but my sister is staring at me with sad eyes. Once I do notice I glance at my wrist. More than five straight line scars can be seen, most of them are pretty small but there is one huge that goes over a few of the small scars.

I sigh to myself and then look at my other wrist, which is pretty much the same thing. The only difference is that there are about three scars less on my left wrist. I set the helmet to the side and rub my right wrist softly with my thumb.

"I'm sorry," she mutters, her voice all warped and twisted.

I shake my head.

"It wasn't your fault," I answer.

She sits next to me and hugs me close. About a month back I would've cried and wailed in her warm embrace, but nothing happens now. I do not cry, I do not even feel sad. I return the gesture though, I hug her tightly and breathe out loudly as she squeezes me in her arms.

"I have to go to cram school now..." she says as she leans in to kiss my forehead, "be good, ok?"

I nod slowly and rub my forehead. She leaves my room silently and I sit there on my bed staring at my new playthings. I chuckle to myself a little and pull the box a little closer to me. The only thing remaining inside is a cable. I take it out and inspect it thoroughly. One of the ends is weird, a really weird tip. I grab the helmet from my side and turn it around as I see the hole were the weird cable could perfectly fit in. The other end of the cable is more recognizable, it looked like any other thing I would plug into a wall socket. I suppose it's for charging the helmet then.

"Akari, what are you doing?" says a voice by the door.

I know who is standing by the door, it's my mother. I don't look in her direction, but instead focus my attention on the NerveGear I'm holding in my hands.

"Are you going to spend all of today in bed, again?" she says with a stern tone.

I don't answer at all. I reach over for the game's box and pretend to read it.

"This is not what your father would've liked of you," she says.

"How do you even know what he would've liked…" I respond.

"What was that?" she says raising her voice.

"You heard me…" I reply.

I hear her take a few steps and a sudden stinging pain spreads over my right cheek. I hold my hand up to my cheek and cover it as I look away.

"You got some nerve, it's like you haven't learned a thing."

"Get out of my room," I mumble.

"What?" she says.

"Get out of my room!" I scream.

Silence fills my room and it is soon broken by the steps my mother takes to get out, she closes the door. I'm alone again. I rub my cheek gently and feel tears flowing out of my eyes. My face hurts a lot. I sob a little and lay face down in my bed for a bit. I find myself exhausted and nap for a little.

My cellphone is ringing loudly. I open my eyes slowly and see it vibrating and ringing on my night-stand. I stretch for it but can't seem to reach it. I push myself up a little and pull myself closer to the edge of the bed. I reach for my phone.

"Hello?! Akari?!"

It's my sister.

"I forgot to tell you, you can't play the game before 1 P.M. Well you should be able to play it now though since it is 1 P.M. right now, haha."

"Why is that?" I ask.

"I'm not sure I just read it online," she says while laughing, "Oh, and one last thing. Your log in and password are the same as in your computer. Have fun playing, I'll see you once I get home."

I press the red button on my phone and place it back on the nightstand. The NerveGear and its cable are still in my bed not too far from me. I sit up and scoot over a little to grab the helmet, stretching my arm a bit more I grab the cable and connect it to the helmet. Reaching the socket is a little trickier, but I manage to do so without needing to get up.

I slowly place the helmet over my head and click the little strap under my jaw. It feels very heavy. My phone rings briefly and vibrates again. I got a text message from my sister.

"I'm so sorry, I forgot another thing.  
The helmet activates with a voice  
command, put the thing on and say  
–Link Start-."

Well that is convenient. I make sure the helmet is secured on my head and speak the magic words.

"Link Start."

My sight goes dark suddenly and then a lot of colors appear before my eyes.

-THE NERVEGEAR SYSTEM WILL NOW BEGIN CALIBRATION-

After reading those words, my sight goes dark again and I find myself staring at the ceiling of my room. I must've fallen or something. I guess I should've done this while lying down from the start.

-PLEASE STAND UP AND TAP OVER YOUR SHOULDERS AND CHEST AREA-

A weird feeling goes through my stomach and I look over to my side. The chair is just a few steps away from my bed…but I can't really stand up. I ignore the instructions and just tap my shoulders and chest while sitting up in my bed.

-VERIFIED-

-PROCEED TO TAP THE AREA AROUND YOUR HIPS AND LEGS-

The instructions are making me uncomfortable, but if I want to see what this SAO is all about I'll have to hope the helmet recognizes my legs properly without the need of me having to stand up. I tap all over my hips and then tap over my legs slowly. The message disappears and nothing pops up for a few seconds.

-VERIFIED-

-PLEASE LAY DOWN ON A COMFORTABLE SURFACE-

I lay on my back slowly and other message pops up.

-INITIALIZING-

The bright colors flood my eyes again and suddenly I'm prompted with a log-in screen. Like my sister said I put in my user name and password and another prompt appears.

-CREATE NEW-

I select the option and another thing pops up.

-PLEASE NAME YOUR CHARACTER-

I ponder about it for a few seconds and finally decide to go with the name of a butterfly, a pretty one at that. Maybe a little too cliché or girly even for me, but I really love how this one looks.

-ELINA-

-IS THIS NAME OK?-

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/29/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading!

This is a very short chapter compared to what I usually write, but it's quite fitting and I also thought a little backstory was in order. Don't worry chapters will only be this short when some backstory comes around, and even then since I got down to revising my whole story, these backstory chapters have gotten longer and more in-depth.

AT this point in the original uploading of this story I started replying to reviews, so down below from here on out you can see the replies and conversations I had with a few of my readers.

**ICO:** As of this moment the story has 30 chapters, I post them only once a week because I want to pace myself as I keep writing more chapters. Do not worry I try to keep all my content interesting and even I can realize when it'll be time to end this story. BUT. We are just getting started!

Also would like to thank you all and share with you the fact that all this month of February I have gotten more than 5 views every day, even with some high spikes in between days. I'm very happy about this and thought I should thank you guys or something.

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Unrequited"


	12. Chapter 12 - Unrequited

**Chapter 12 - Unrequited**

**December/21st/2022**

**Third Floor of Aincrad**

**Daath**

It's been a weird week. This does not mean that something bad happened. It's just been odd feeling. With a new addition to our team and the clearing of the second floor, it has all just been feeling rushed for some reason. Perhaps I'm the only one feeling this way.

In a way, I guess I'm lucky. I'm surrounded by good looking women so I guess I can't complain. Although I think I can complain about Al though. I could have certainly used another man for this weird journey.

"Tell us already Elina. What's the deal with you and Al?" Aeri pries.

Elina lights up red and looks immediately at the floor like usual.

"W-w-what do you mean?" she asks nervously.

Kayla giggles a bit and walks in front of me, she's been moving a lot within the little formation we got going on. My best guess is that she likes forests a lot. She's been wandering up and down all over the place since we got to the big trees, and that's an understatement. The big trees are gigantic ones. Ever since you enter this floor, the smallest tree you will see has more than three meters in diameter. Her movements remind me of a chipmunk for some reason.

"You know what I mean," Aeri says, "Are you two going out or something? Are you boyfriend and girlfriend?"

Aeri walks in front of Elina and turns around as she walks backwards to see her as we keep going through the thick of the forest. I had never seen Elina blush this hard ever. If it were me, I would probably stop asking questions since her face alone is a dead giveaway, but then again, Aeri isn't the one to notice details. However...I'm not the one to stop when there's a chance to play around with someone.

"What do you two do when you go into his room at night?" I say.

I can almost see her hair stand for a brief second and her face is now as red as a tomato. Aeri starts laughing loudly and turns around to grab her stomach. I notice Kayla turning around to giggle some more at the poor girl's expression.

"N-no! No! It's not…like that I…I swear," she says with a cute voice.

I chuckle a bit and feel bad for a second. Perhaps I pushed it a bit too far? Nah, there is still plenty of topics to poke at, just for fun.

"Ohoho. Are you two getting all lovey-dovey at night?" Aeri says while covering her mouth.

She just went there. I hold back all urge to laugh as I see Elina's even funnier expression.

"Ease it down," says Kayla "it's none of our business, now is it?"

She now moves next to Elina and pats her head gently. Elina seems to calm down a little and doesn't seem as flustered now.

"Geez, ok MOM!" huffs Aeri.

"I am not your mother," Kayla replies.

"It's a joke! I already told you that like three times!" Aeri shouts.

"And I still do not get what is the point of said joke."

I turn to the dirt road and smile to myself as both girls continue to fight over a misinterpretation of words. I turn around for a second and see Elina standing between Aeri and Kayla with a smile on her face. I really enjoy watching this kind of conversations, I find it relaxing and entertaining. If everyone in the group is good at something that I'm not good at that would be being able to relax.

The light coming in from the top of the trees gives a nice, relaxed ambiance to this part of the forests. Perhaps I could be able to relax a little bit today.

Just for today.

The birds chirp in sync and the wind flows slowly through the trunks and leaves.

Yes, perhaps just for today, I can relax.

I close my eyes for a second and walk slowly as I breathe in deeply. The sound of unsheathing blades takes me out of my trance and I open my eyes. I'm standing less than three feet away from a weird looking humanoid monster with shining red eyes. It looks like a mass of roots and leaves all crumbled together to make it look like a swamp monster. It is disturbing.

"Are you going to take out your sword?" Aeri asks.

I sigh loudly and reach for the back of my head. As soon as I feel the grip in my palm I close it and unsheathe my blade with a swift move.

Was it so hard to ask? Just one fetch quest without having to fight? What am I thinking? This game is about killing stuff. Most of the time anyways.

"Fine, let's do this," I say.

The enemy shouts at us with a high-pitched piercing voice and starts running towards us. I see Kayla and Elina run past me as they both activate sword skills almost simultaneously. Talking about coordination.

Elina crosses through, allowing her to get the first strike on the enemy. She stabs it in the chest and let's go of her sword as she twirls around to smack its face with her buckler. Impressed, I grin a bit and ready a sword skill of my own as she retrieves her blade from the foe's chest.

Seconds after that, Kayla swoops by and attacks through the enemy as she draws a straight bright yellow line. This makes the enemy stagger, thus giving me a chance to move in. The sword in my hand is already vibrating as if it were a beast waiting to be released upon its pray. I dash in quickly and drive my sword cleanly through the humanoid. It slowly glides in until the skin of the enemy is practically touching the grip of my sword. I twist the sword around furiously completing my technique and back away to allow Aeri to jump in.

When we are in a group, our fights usually don't last long, we are all almost in the same levels. Except for Elina, who always seems to be at least two levels below us. This makes for a great advantage in battle. We all have kind of the same damage output, so pretty much everything in our way we tear down with ease. We do have our rough days though and I have a feeling this is going to be one of those days.

I see Aeri dropping down from the sky to impale the objective. Just as she is about to make contact with her sword the weird set of plants moves backwards almost like a fluid and stands in front of Aeri as she drops down.

"Huh?" Aeri says.

The enemy suddenly swings its whole body around and smacks Aeri with its side. This makes her fall on her butt and it takes a significant part of her health.

"They did not do that in the beta…" I mutter.

"Not the best time to say so…" Aeri mumbles as she stands up.

Kayla jumps not far from me and leaps from the side of a tree as her sword glows. She is a very acrobatic fighter. She twists in the air as she drops down to impale the enemy right on the head.

"Bull's-eye," she says with a giggle.

The monster staggers a little with Kayla's rapier still piercing through it, and then things take a turn to the even more unexpected. Its body starts taking over Kayla's arm as if consuming her. Kayla tries to let go of her blade but it's too late. The vines and overall structure of the damned thing start devouring her. Aeri and Elina quickly run towards it to start attacking, but I find myself frozen on the spot. The green, gooey substance starts reaching her face when I realize I need to move.

"Hey! Daath! Do something!" I hear Aeri cry out.

I place my right foot in front of my left and start running towards Kayla. The enemy is no longer fighting back. It is only focused on taking over Kayla's body. I didn't notice before but her health is approaching the red zone.

"What do I do?!" Kayla asks in fear.

"Let me think…err…this things have a core, kind of like a rock," I comment, "Can you still move your hand around in there?"

"And you held that back until now?!" she grunts.

"Just answer the question," I insist.

She slowly nods and the green substance starts to go over her mouth leaving her muffled. I can only hear her scream through the vines and leaves that are desperately trying to take over her.

"Look for something solid inside and crush it with your hand!" I yell.

I see the last of her head be consumed just as I say this. I stand back and fall on my back, I tripped with something.

"No! No!" Aeri screams as she drops her sword and starts trying to claw Kayla out of the mass of green stuff.

Elina drops to her knees and cover her ears. A burst of light blinds me for a second. As I prepare for the worst I open my eyes slowly and see Kayla breathing heavily on the ground. She screams loudly into the air and drops to her back as she continues to breathe heavily.

"You did it! You really did it!" Elina says cheerfully.

Aeri picks up her sword and sheathes it slowly.

"You had me worried for a second there," she says with a smile.

"You," Kayla says from the ground in the scariest tone I've heard. Not at all like her usual tone, it feels almost demonic.

As I stand up I notice she is pointing at me with her finger.

"If we encounter another foe, you shall give us what you know about it," she grunts, "Preferably before any of us dies, please."

"Uhm…yeah. Sorry. I have a slow reaction time, I apologize," I answer.

"Very, very…slow," she says and breathes in deeply. "I seriously felt like I was suffocating in there."

Elina chuckles a bit and helps Kayla up on her feet.

"We should be close by now, we just need that ring they asked for and head back to town," I say.

The three girls nod at me and I start walking again. Kayla drinks a potion down and keeps breathing in and out deeply. It's only natural, she must have been very scared. Hell, I know I was.

I seriously do not know what would happen if someone of the group died. I feel like I wouldn't be able to take it. It's too much responsibility and it would definitely be blamed on someone.

Perhaps I'm just overthinking things.

Again.

"Am I still the only one that finds it really odd that Al didn't come along with us?" Kayla comments.

"Yes," I say along with Aeri and Elina.

"Oh my, you can't be serious," she replies.

"Oh, but we are. The guy is just like that sometimes. That or he wanted to do something he didn't want us knowing about," I say.

"Speaking of which," Aeri says, "Do you think maybe he is cheating on our poor little Elina?"

Elina gasps and Aeri holds her close while petting her head.

"He wouldn't do th-that!" Elina says.

"AHA! I knew it! You two ARE together!" Aeri replies.

"I…I never said that," Elina says nervously.

Her face becomes flushed again and she covers it with her hands after pushing Aeri away from her.

"Aeri, please give Elina a break," says Kayla, "You two have been teasing her ever since we left the town."

Elina goes behind Kayla as if she was using her as a shield for the teasing. I find the action adorable and smile a bit. Aeri pouts and places her right hand on her hip. She takes a few steps ahead of me in an attempt to separate herself a little from the group. It reminds me of what my sister did whenever she got a little upset at me. She would give the cold shoulder and pretend to ignore me for a bit.

The little things Aeri does sometime make me wonder who really is the youngest in our group. While Elina is both physically and mentally the youngest, the little fits Aeri throws on her own normally resemble a ten year old. Kayla however is a whole different deal when compared to both Elina and Aeri. She is elegant and intelligent, not to say Aeri or Elina are dumb or anything, but while Aeri acts on impulse and Elina on orders, Kayla is able to assess and understands our standing before attacking or taking any action when under pressure.

I might be rambling now, but there's really not much else to focus on in this forest. Kayla is the tallest of all the girls, then Aeri and obviously Elina comes last. If I were to compare the heights of everyone in the group it would definitely start with Al being the tallest. Then after him there's me, then Kayla, after her comes Aeri and finally Elina.

It takes me a bit to realize, I am already walking quite some feet away from Kayla and Elina who were talking in the back. Somehow I find myself isolated next to Aeri even if the others weren't far behind.

"What are you thinking about?" she asks softly.

"Huh? Uhm…nothing really. Just rambling in my own head," I answer.

She turns her head a little and smiles at me with her eyes closed. Odd.

"You know, I've been thinking," she says.

"About what?"

"You know, stuff," she says and giggles.

"Hmm..." I huff.

"You are somewhat dense sometimes, you know?" she comments.

"What in the world is that even supposed to mean?" I say.

She skips along further away from me and suddenly Elina tags behind her. I hear the leaves rustle under my feet as I walk and Kayla approaches me from behind.

"My my, you are really dense," she says.

"What does that mean?!" I ask frustrated.

Kayla giggles at me while covering her mouth and then smiles. I just scratch my head and hang it a little as I try to think about what they mean by dense.

"I will make a deal with you," she says, "Let us play a game. If you lose, I will tell you what she means once we get to town."

"What's the point? I can just not do a thing and I'll get my answer. Unless there's a-"

"Catch," she finishes my sentence.

I smile a little, I find her choice of words very interesting. I'm always up for a challenge.

"If I get the ring before you do. You will act as my servant for one full day of my choosing," she says with a diabolical grin.

I think about it for a second. I argue with myself in my head as I ponder on what the best option would be, but sadly, my ego takes over.

"Deal," I say while shaking her hand.

* * *

"Well, that is a spectacular way to lose a game," says Kayla.

She stands above me with a big smile and a shiny silver ring between her thumb and index finger.

"I don't consider tripping over something to be spectacular," I mutter with my face against the ground.

The blonde laughs loudly and pushes the ring into her pockets. With my self-esteem as low as my face is to the ground, I stand up and dust off my pants.

"So, we were getting pummeled while you two played a game?" Aeri says angrily.

Elina appears behind her sheathing her own sword and an almost as pouty face. I sheathe my sword as well and check my inventory for some potions.

"These enemies were hardly a challenge. Don't get mad," I say.

Finding the potions I toss them to Elina and Aeri since their health dropped a bit.

"There. Does that make us even?" I ask.

"Hmph," she snarls while drinking.

I smile and turn my back on Eli and Aeri to look at Kayla who is grinning from eye to eye with a wicked expression. I hear that little voice in my head. "You really did screw up, haha." Even I recognize how stupid I must've looked tripping over nothing.

"Fine. Let's get this over with, Madam," I murmur.

"Oh, haha. Not just yet, dear. I still have to pick a day," she says.

"What?"

"I said a day of my choosing, or did you forget?"

"Must've slipped my mind…"

"Did you two bet something?" Elina asks.

"Yes, sort of…" I mutter.

"Is it bad that you lost?" she questions.

"Not at all, but I would've preferred if I had won," I say as I pat her head a little.

"Well, back to town. Shall we?" Kayla says.

We all nod at her and start retracing the way we came from. It takes quite some time, the forest is absurdly big. It doesn't help that the town itself is hidden in the middle of the forest, but we get there and for the first time in a long while we manage to do so before sundown.

Kreika, that's the town's name. It is one not many players will encounter at first, it is really well hidden. It is also the farthest apart from this floor's main entrance. We chose to stay here for the time being, the plan being to lay low. We do not want to worry another encounter with the soon-to-be guild The White Snakes.

"It is nice to see you arrived unscathed," says the quest NPC.

"I would not exactly say unscathed," Kayla grunts.

"You say it as if you expected an answer from the NPC," says Aeri.

"I am just, how would you say it…" Kayla stops for a second, "throwing it out there."

Elina giggles a bit and I chuckle a bit myself. Aeri puts both of her hands on her hips and breathes in deeply.

"Laugh all you want. It is not my fault I wasn't educated like a little princess."

"Yes, dear. It is, in fact, not your fault. Bummer," Kayla says.

Aeri flashes her teeth at her and frowns at the joke.

"Ladies, calm down. Kayla hand over the ring so we can go to the inn," I interrupt.

"I will do as commanded," she says mocking me.

She hands over the ring and the NPC gives us the usual speech of how grateful he is for us to have completed such a hard request. Blah… Blah…blah. Result screens pop up in front of us splitting the EXP and col evenly.

"Level twelve it is then," Aeri says.

"Same here," I say.

"How come we always level up at the same time?" Aeri asks.

"Perhaps it is destiny. Perhaps you are a match made in heaven," Kayla says before bursting out in giggles with Elina.

They walk off into town and I try to understand, again, what she could mean. I look at Aeri and notice she is blushing.

No way.

I cough loudly in an attempt to break the awkward silence.

"Er...we should get back to the inn," I say.

"Oh...oh right, right," Aeri says nervously.

I think I might be overthinking things again. It can´t be. Not her. It's not like her at all.

I open the door to the inn and see Kayla, Elina and Al sitting on a table near the hallway leading to the rooms. Elina is hugging Al cheerfully and he just sits there with a smile on his face. Kayla finishes ordering something as I sit down next to her and across from Al and Elina.

"You noticed already, am I right?" Kayla comments with her eerie smile.

I nod and breathe in and out, almost sighing.

"Oh my, this might be fun," she says.

"Tsk…shut up," I mutter.

"Huh? What happened?" Al asks.

"You might not find out," Kayla says and giggles.

"Well that answer cleared all my doubt," Al says sarcastically.

Elina whispers something on Al's ear and starts laughing after doing so. Then he looks at me and I make sure to put on a very uncomfortable expression over my face.

"Oh..." Al mumbles.

The feeling I have right now is familiar to what I can only assume someone would feel when every single person in the room is plotting against him. Aeri comes over with a mug on her hands and sits down next to me.

Everyone else exchanges looks and suddenly Al, Eli, and Kayla move three tables to the right. Well shit.

"Uh…Aeri I…"

"I'm sorry… This must be embarrassing for you," she mutters.

"Not at all, it's just that I didn't see it coming, like at all," I say, "I really don't know what to say."

I see her fiddle her fingers on her mug a little and she bends over the table a bit.

"Just say what you feel," she says in a really soft voice.

Fuck.

"Aeri…you see, uhm…"

I stumble with my words and can't find the right thing to say. I somehow feared this might happen. Not that she would fall in love with me, that is far too self-centered. Just the scenario itself, an unrequited love can tear apart a lot of things, and one of those things might as well be this group we managed to assemble.

"I'm not exactly looking for this…right now…" I say.

She stops her fingers and moves her mug to the side.

I've definitely done it this time.

"I understand, don't worry," she says with a painful smile.

She drinks her mug empty and stands up to head to her room.

"See ya in the morning, chief," she says before walking off on me.

"Here is the order of your table, sire," says the NPC as he sets a tray on the table.

Soon enough, I have Al, Eli and Kayla returning to the table.

"You are mean," Eli says as she reaches for a piece of pie.

"Yeah, man, kinda harsh," Al follows.

"I'm pretty sure there was another way to set her down," Kayla adds.

"Who the hell falls in love while being in a constant life or death scenario?" I say as I grab my head.

"That itself factors for strengthening the bonds I would say," Kayla comments, "besides, you have an example of that in front of you."

I look at Al and Elina as they eat food from the tray.

"Yeah, but they are… They are… I don't know," I huff. "I just think it's not the time."

"Hey, I'm not saying you did something wrong. Just saying that this might have some backlash," she answers.

"And that is my fault?"

She nods and starts eating some food herself. I reach for an apple and bite off a big chunk.

"Should I say sorry or something?" I mutter.

"You are really dense, bro," Al says.

"What the hell does that even mean?!"

"Calm down, I say you let her be for tonight," Kayla interjects.

I return to eating some more, time passes by and soon enough I find myself sitting alone at the table. Well, all of that went horrible wrong. I sigh loudly and stretch my arms a bit.

"You seem unhappy."

"Argo, how nice of you to visit," I say imitating Al's tone.

"Is this a bad time?" she asks.

"Not at all, what's up?"

She sits across from me and takes off her hood. She lifts her hand and orders water.

"I have information I'm pretty sure you'll be interested in."

"I don't think I have time to chase down someone right now," I say, "Let alone the money to pay you."

"What about something?" she says, "A skill, an unique skill."

"I am all ears," I answer.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/29/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

I think one of the few things SAO's anime misses out on is character development like this. Yeah it focuses briefly some times on Kirito and Asuna, but I think it needs more of it sometimes.

As always if you like what you read, please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Another Day"


	13. Chapter 13 - Another Day

**Chapter 13 - Another Day**

**December/24th/2022**

**Alshep**

I didn't notice any sooner but I can now see the turquoise tone of the wall thanks to the sunlight that is starting to creep inside the room from the near window. I like the color, I like it quite a lot to be honest. It's easy on the eyes and it looks nice on clothing, or at least I think so. The shirt I'm wearing right now is that color anyways. While going out to town I would wear something over it, like a coat, usually gray or black. If I were going outside of town I would just cover it with armor. I'm the kind of guy that prefers to wear what he likes instead of going for efficient gear. Daath has lectured me a few times about this, in the earlier days at least. I should wear something that at the very least boosts my defense, he says, but I refuse, naturally.

I feel my leg is going numb, so I adjust my position in the chair a little. How can I even feel my leg go numb? My best guess is that perhaps my brain has become too used to the game. It's seriously weird how I haven't grown accustomed to sleeping in chairs. I've been sleeping like so pretty much since the start. I keep staring off at the wall for a bit and become self-conscious for a minute. I suddenly feel trapped and very uncomfortable, the outline of the HUD for some reason becomes too noticeable and I just close my eyes tightly to avoid seeing it. That's right, I'm basically in a coma, I say to myself in my head. The thought itself might be dumb, because my brain is actually lucid, in a way at least, but the simple fact that what I see before my eyes, my body, isn't really my physical body bothers me greatly. I rest my eyes easy for a minute or two and open them slowly to see Elina rise from the bed not too far from where I'm sitting.

She slowly sits up as the sheets covering her move around. Rubbing her eyes slowly, she opens them to stare into space for a few seconds before yawning. She closes her mouth and turns her head very slowly trying to locate me. Our eyes meet and she yawns again, after that she smiles warmly.

"Goo…morning," she whispers.

"It's good morning," I tease.

"Aw…geez...isn't it a little too early for you to tease me?" she says.

I chuckle and stand up to stretch a little.

"It is never too early for anything," I say with a smile.

"If you say so," she says with another yawn.

She lies on her back again and turns around to bury her face on her pillow. I can see her moving her feet up and down under the covers and then she relaxes.

"Can I ask a question?" I say.

She turns her head and doesn't say anything right away.

"Sure...I guess."

"How does it feel to do that? You know for you," I say, "that didn't come out right…."

"Oh… You mean moving my legs?" she says with a withdrawn tone.

"Yeah…uh, I'm sorry, you don't have to answer," I say as I go through my menu.

"No, no, it's ok. I'm sorta surprised you didn't ask earlier."

"Really?" I reply

She nods and sits up again with a smile. I feel somewhat better with myself and sit down in the chair again.

"But, come closer," she says cheerfully.

"Hah, alright," I say while I stand up.

I walk over to the bed and sit on the edge facing her.

"Well I wasn't always disabled, that much you know," she says, "I guess it just feels normal, you know? It feels like it used to. It's hard to explain…sorry."

"It's ok, it was an odd question anyway," I answer.

"You are curious, it's alright," she says with a bright smile.

The usual beeping tells me I just received a message and proceed to open it through my menu. It's from Kayla.

From: Kayla  
To: Alshep  
Subject: Hurry!  
Message: We are close to leaving. I suggest you two hurry. Our dear "Chief" isn't exactly in the holiday mood.

I knew at least someone of the group would hate Christmas. I guess it's just up to our "Chief" this time around. I would have expected Aeri to hate the holiday, but what the hell, I guess I find this surprising.

"Wait…what day is it today?" Elina asks all of the sudden.

"The twenty fourth, Christmas eve," I say.

Her usual happy expression turns into one of disgust.

"God…I hate Christmas," she mutters.

And the day is just starting.

* * *

"Alright, is this all of us?" Daath asks.

"Are you blind? Or have you been hanging out with another set of four people?" I reply. "Of course it's all of us."

He looks at me with a rather stern expression and sighs. Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer. It's not my fault. Aeri coughs slightly at a humorous attempt to break the silence, I chuckle a bit and straighten up in my seat.

"Stupid jokes aside," Daath says. "Do you know what day is it today?"

"It's Christmas Eve!" Aeri shouts cheerfully.

"No!" Daath raises his voice.

"It is not Christmas eve…" Aeri says in a depressed tone.

"Today is training day," Daath exclaims, "We've been slacking off guys, we have to go out and get some EXP."

"No, I'm pretty sure it's Christmas Eve," I say to piss him off.

"It's Christmas Eve!" Aeri yells again.

"Would you two shut it for a second?!" he says slamming the table.

"Calm down a little Daath. No need to be so moody about it," Kayla says as she crosses her arms.

"You guys are taking this as a game, once outside we are in danger," he comments, "If we are not strong enough, we will die. This is not a game."

"Well, we are technically in a ga-" I interrupt myself.

Elina, Kayla and Aeri are staring me down fiercely. I swallow hard and shut the hell up. I was just about to push it too far.

"Ok, chief. Where to?" Aeri says.

"Don't call me that please. I know you guys do it as a joke, but it's somewhat irritating," he says.

"Well, you do train us and literally give us mission directives. What should we call you then?" Kayla says.

"Just…call me by my name," He mutters before sitting down on the table.

"Look," I huff. "It is not a joke, you are our leader, man. You trained me and Elina in the beginning. No matter how much we argue and contradict each other. I look up to you, the way I would do to a leader."

I see Aeri and Kayla smile along with Elina. Daath chuckles a bit and smiles again.

"Now, why don't you talk like that all the time?" he replies.

"I don't know. I enjoy being the asshole of the group I guess."

Daath chuckles again and the mood settles in nicely. I smile to myself and feel satisfied for some odd reason.

"So what are we going to do in this training day?" Elina asks.

"Just some easy fetch quests. Maybe just killing monsters randomly," he answers, "I would want to focus on you, Elina. You are still level eleven. The main issue at hand now is us leaving, we should go now."

"I'm just two levels behind is it really that bad?" she says.

"I don't want to risk it," Daath insists.

Elina looks at me somewhat confused and I just nod at her. It is true everyone except her right now is level thirteen. It is natural for us to be worried about her I guess. In some way she is the little sister of the group, and I'm her boyfriend or something…I guess. I feel like slapping myself over the string of thought I just had.

"Ok, so where to, chie-…Daath." Aeri says.

"Into the forest. The enemies are tough, but manageable with a group our size. It'll be ok," he answers.

Kayla suddenly shakes in a very odd way and she sighs deeply.

"Please tell me we are not heading to those disturbing moss things that almost swallowed me."

"Was it really that bad?" I ask.

She turns to me with and angry look and suddenly I feel tiny and weak. God she can be scary.

"Was it bad? Was it bad?! I almost died you buffoon!" she yells.

"Okay guys, simmer down. We need to leave soon," Daath says.

Thankfully Kayla backs away from me and I'm able to breathe easy once again. I'm about to stand up when a loud crashing sound booms through the inn. It is very loud, sounded almost like an explosion.

The HUD suddenly shows a red warning and the color signaling that we were in a safe area disappears.

"What the hell was that?!" I yell.

"Shit…I wanted us out of here before this…" Daath mutters.

"You fucking idiot… What didn't you tell us this time?!" I ask filled with anger.

"This is an event…a twisted Christmas event," he says.

"What the hell are you talking about? It isn't even Christmas yet!" I say.

I hear another loud boom and I'm pushed violently by something. I see everyone's health in my HUD go down significantly as I try to get up. A quick glance to the ceiling makes me realize there is no more ceiling. A towering green-ish fiend stands above us lifting its massive fist ready to strike again.

"Everyone move!" Aeri shouts.

I stand up as quick as possible and locate Elina quickly. She is still lying on the floor trying to get up. I start running and grab her arm, I pull on her and make her stand up fast. She complains a bit but I keep pulling her close as we exit the inn. Just in time to see the giant mass of trees and vines come crashing down, doing more damage to the building.

"Oh dear god… It's one of the monsters that almost swallowed me." Kayla mutters next to me.

"Oh really? I didn't recall you saying they were the size of fucking buildings!" I say.

"It was a million times smaller…I swear," she replies.

The giant turns its head towards us and a high pitched scream is heard. It is so high it almost gives me a head ache. Elina covers her ears and so does Kayla.

I cover my ears as well. Daath pulls on Kayla's shoulder and I can only see him mouth words at us. He constantly waves his hand towards him. I grab Elina's hand and take her with me to where Daath is pointing to.

The screaming stops just as we reach the back of a house where Aeri is standing with her sword drawn. Kayla pulls her rapier out and Elina draws her sword as she readies her buckler.

"Want to brief us genius?" I snarl a Daath.

He sighs and takes out his sword as well.

"This is an event that happens randomly in Christmas Eve only on this floor. It's called Christmas Miracle," he says.

"How do you even know about this?!" I yell at Daath, "The beta didn't run that long!"

"Argo warned me about it dumbass!" he replies. "I wanted us to be out of here before it came here."

"What the hell? Why place an event on a town?" Aeri asks.

"Beats me, but it's up to us to destroy that thing now," he says. "and that guy apparently."

"Huh, what guy?" Kayla asks.

Daath raises his hand and points behind us. We all turn around to see a lone man with the bulkiest armor I've ever seen approach us. He wields a long spear and a teardrop shield almost as big as his armor.

"Hey, are you ok?" he asks from afar.

I turn around to see the big green monster ready his fist to crush the house behind us. My sudden move makes everyone turn around and notice it just in time to move away to safety. I pull out my sword and I feel a hand on my shoulder. I quickly move away and point my sword to the tall armored man.

"What do you want?" I ask.

"I just want to help, there's no need for violence friend," he says gently.

His voice is very relaxed and his expression without fear or anger, it is way too peaceful.

"I'm not your frie-" I manage to say before he pushes me away with inhuman strength.

I fall on my ass and one of the giant's arms fall down violently right in front of me right where the armored guy was standing. Did he die?

The giant mass of greens jerks its arm off the ground and scream again in that high pitched tone. The man in armor stands peacefully as he regains his relaxed stance after attacking the massive monster.

"How did you do that?" I ask.

He turns to me with eyes closed and a smile on his face.

"I'm just good at this game I guess."

I stand up and grab my sword. Seeing it shine bright green I smile and start my run to the giant's feet. Aeri jumps on a roof and lands perfectly as her sword shines. Kayla is attacking one of the arms that missed them and is currently stuck on the ground along with Elina.

"Don't get too close! It'll swallow you if given the chance," Daath screams as he rushes the monster.

"Be careful," I hear someone say close to me.

I turn my head a little behind me and see the bulky armor approaching me with his spear at the ready.

"You worry about yourself," I say, "…friend."

With another smile he nods at me and starts heading over to where Daath is standing. Where did his guy come from anyways?

I look up at the beast just as I'm about to reach its feet and notice its health has not been depleted at all. It took me a while, but then I also noticed the purple cursor right above its head.

"This is a purple monster!" I yell.

"Then don't face it head on genius!" Aeri screams back at me.

I pull my sword back and swing it over my head to attack its feet, the damage effect goes off and my sword connects successfully. I quickly unleash another skill and slash it hard a few times. The monster doesn't even flinch. What kind of skill was the other guy using, it at the very least managed to make the giant jerk his arm. It made it look like what I was doing were mere scratches.

"Hey! Armor guy!" I yell.

He finishes attacking the green giant and turns his face to me.

"What level are you?" I ask.

Aeri leaps from a building and attacks near the chest, she then falls to the ground gracefully and again jumps on a roof. I completely lose track of Kayla, Daath and Elina. Their health bars remain the same after the first attack so that's good.

"Fourteen," the man in armor says.

"Holy fuck, really?" I ask awestruck.

It's not that big of a difference but he is better than us that's for sure. He simply nods and then returns his attention to the fight. Aeri is staring in awe now. The man is one mere level above us, but that just manages to make all the difference.

"Let's go into the forest for a bit, it can't get us there he is too big!" Daath instructs.

"What makes you think it won't destroy the trees?" Kayla shouts.

"Just do it! We need some sort of plan," he replies.

We all heed to his order and go into the forest. It is a bit of a rushed mess but we all gather behind the biggest tree in sight and rest a bit as we drink some potions.

"First things first. Who are you?" Daath asks to the armored spear wielder.

"I'm Owl," he simply responds.

"Owl? Just like that?" Aeri asks rudely.

"Yes, just like that."

I glance around a bit and see that everyone is as confused as I am. Where did he come from? Why is he stronger than us? Why the hell is he acting so calm?!

"Ok…uhm...Owl, if you don't mind I think we could use your help," Daath says.

The guy turns to him and nods. I guess that's a yes.

"Alright this is what we are going to do," Daath says.

* * *

Everything is a big chaotic mess, Daath's plan didn't work as expected and we find ourselves fighting the exact same way we started. Aeri keeps attacking relentlessly from the roof, but we only chipped away at ten percent of the giant's health. It is incredibly discouraging. The man in armor is a tank and I dare say his simple cooperation with us is giving us a slight advantage.

He is at a higher level than us, but even with his help we were struggling, but as I said he is at least giving us a fighting chance. A whirring sound sets off near me and I see Elina cross my side as she attacks with her best skill. She slashes the foot fast and savagely, I stop counting at five hits and focus on the cooldown time of my own skills. I still got a few seconds to go.

"Daath, does this massive one have a core as well?" Kayla asks as she steps back.

Daath blocks one of the vines that comes loose and tries to hit him and then jumps back to a safe distance.

"It should… It is the same monster, just bigger," he huffs.

"Bigger is an understatement," I mumble.

"I heard that!" he replies.

I see a vine coming towards me and lift up my sword to block it. It clashes against my blade, but instead of backing off it starts to wrap around it. It makes a couple circles around it quickly and it forcefully yanks my sword away from my hands.

I see the vine holding my blade a few feet above and then it throws it away far behind me. The vine swings back and attacks me. Luckily Elina cuts it just in time. The severed vine bursts into light and I begin my run towards my discarded sword.

"Is it safe to assume the core is massive as well?" Kayla inquiries.

"I would think so, yeah," Daath answers.

"Owl, watch out!" Aeri shouts.

The man in armor isn't paying attention, so he doesn't notice the giant's arm coming down on him. For a brief second the thought of his death crosses my mind yet again, but just as last time the colossal enemy jerks its fist off the ground and I see the man named Owl chuckling with his spear in the air.

"So, in this case, how do we get to the core?" Kayla questions.

It looks like she is totally disregarding the current situation and just blatantly asking questions to the air in hopes of getting answers. Daath does answer of course, but it just feels like they aren't taking this very seriously.

"Unless one of us jumps at it and waits to get swallowed, there's no way to reach it," Daath says as he finishes his attack, "and even if we do that, there's no telling where the core is, it would be very risky."

"How risky exactly?" I ask.

"It could be a one way ticket," Daath answers.

I pick up my sword from the ground and point with it at the distant giant's chest. Somewhere around there I guess. I start another run, but this time to where Owl is standing.

"Don't do it you thick headed idiot!" Aeri yells to me.

I chuckle at the insult and start speeding up as I close in on Owl.

"Hey, Owl!" I scream.

He turns to me for a brief second.

"Launch me! Use your shield!" I yell as I get closer.

"Are you sure?" he says.

I nod and immediately he drops his spear to grab his shield with both hands.

"What do I aim for?" he asks.

"The chest!"

I jump just as he positions himself and land on the lower part of his shield. He grunts and with little difficulty swings his shield under me, launching me right towards the enemy's chest. I'll be honest, I did not expect this to work.

I ready the piercing skill as I'm flying through the air and scream loudly, maybe from both the adrenaline and fear I don't know for sure. The whirring sound intensifies as I get close and it booms loudly as my sword pierces through the giant and impales itself right on the chest.

I hang on to my sword's grip and place my legs on the monster to have some more space to hold on to. I can feel the mass of vines, leaves and trees move under my feet. It feels somewhat disgusting to say the least.

"Nice throw!" I yell at Owl.

He acknowledges me with a nod and picks up his spear to continue his attack. I see Elina from where I'm holding on and see her face shows a little fear. I'll be ok, after all I've got a few promises to keep. I smile and then feel the vines starting to loop around my feet. Like snakes they twirl around my feet and start going up my legs.

This is it.

"Idiot, you can still let go. Come on! It isn't worth it," Daath yells from down below.

I start pulling my sword just as I feel I'm secure enough to not fall from the vines and manage to pull it out rather easily. My full weight is now supported simply by the beast itself trying to consume me. I switch my blade to my left hand and quickly fumble through my pockets to get a potion.

I find the small vial and quickly drink it as the moss and vines reach up to my belly. It feels odd. While the giant is trapping me with its own body I still retain little mobility in my legs. As if I was trapped in some kind of jelly, making it hard for me to move.

"I know it's a bad time to ask…but what does this core look like?!" I ask loudly.

"I don't know…I don't know. I'm sorry, it's just like a round hard thing. Like a rock," Kayla says with desperation in her voice.

Her description is rather poor, I guess this is really a one way ticket then. The greens reach up to my arms and my health starts depleting slowly. The potion recovers some of my health as I'm taking damage so it looks like my health is barely dropping.

The monster slowly starts creeping over my face and I find myself breathing in deeply as it swallows me whole. It is dark, very dark, but I can see a faint light not far from me. Maybe it's the core? Then again Kayla didn't mention they glowed or anything.

I can still sort of move inside but I feel a strange force trying to restrain me. The monster obviously doesn't want me moving inside. I activate all my skills as fast as I can one after the other. Every time I attack it feels slightly easier to move and I had set myself to reach the glowing object.

It is exhausting, not only do I need to fight a force trying to hold me down, but the pressure the giant's body applies to mine is everything but comfortable. I finally reach the source of the glowing light and touch something hard and smooth right in front of me.

"This must be it," I mutter to myself.

I hear the beast scream loudly again and the vines around me get incredibly tight. They start eating at me health faster and it becomes even harder to move. It must know I reached its weak point.

I trigger a skill and slowly move my sword to make contact with the glowing orb. My health reaches the critical level and the system decides to warm me about it. My sword is slowly getting to the glowing orb when a vine crushes my right arm violently making me drop my sword.

Shit.

I struggle hard to reach my sword but it quickly sinks deeper into the monster and away from my reach. I can hear my heart beating, nothing else. Slowly my desperate grunts start booming in my ears it makes for the most frustrating moment so far in this game.

Somehow I manage to open my menu and try to take out something useful. In a moment of desperation I find the most unusual piece of equipment of them all.

-Wolf Blade (Broken)-

Suddenly I'm glad I kept this piece of crap. The broken blade materializes into my hand and I start trying to reach the orb again with the jagged blade. My health reaches fifty points, and I start to shake and move violently. I need to reach it…

Forty three.

Thirty five.

Twelve.

I'm going to die.

Scared, I close my eyes.

A cracking noise is heard all of the sudden and my health stops dropping. I open my eyes slowly and see that the badly broken blade managed to make contact with the orb. The orb starts cracking and it bursts into light some few short seconds after. I am blinded by light shortly after. The monster's body must've exploded. It is just as the light stops blurring my sight that I realize I am more than a few feet from the ground.

Well, at least I managed to kill it, everyone will be safe now. I plummet to the ground, but suddenly I stop falling. I don't slam into the ground like I thought I would. I turn my sight a little and meet with the new face. Owl caught me before slamming into the ground.

"Are you alright?" he asks

"Yeah…thank you," I say. "Not that I'm ungrateful, but please put me down."

He is holding me like a princess and it is embarrassing. He apologizes and sets me on my feet.

"Here drink this, buddy," he says as he hands me a red vial.

"Thanks," I answer.

I uncap the tiny vial and start drinking and smile as see my health slowly starting to go up. Cutting it close once again, it's almost as if I like near death scenarios. I kneel on the spot and sit on my ass to rest.

"Impressive," Owl comments.

"Ha, thanks," I say smugly.

"Al!" I hear from afar.

Elina is running towards me with her eyes filled with tears. She drops her sword and her buckler and continues running to me. As she reaches me she drops on her knees and hugs me tightly. I support myself with one hand placed on the floor behind me and place the other over her back and hug her gently.

"I'm ok, don't worry," I whisper.

"I thought you were gone…" she says close to my ear.

I see Aeri come down from a roof near us and she sheathes her sword. She then leans her back on the wall and slides down to sit and drink a potion. Kayla and Daath are walking from down the street up to us. Elina stops burying her face on my chest and wipes her tears away. She looks straight into my eyes and smiles, I do so too. Then without thinking I lean in to kiss her. I guess it just feels appropriate. At first she tenses up but then she relaxes and wraps her arms around me.

Sadly this blissful moment lasts but a few seconds.

"I knew it!" Aeri shouts off the top of her lungs.

I open my eyes and stop doing what I was doing. I look ahead and see Aeri make a little victory dance on the spot as she keeps repeating. "I knew it! I knew it!" She then starts running towards us and stops right in front of us.

"I totally knew you two were boyfriend and girlfriend," she shouts.

I stand up and help Elina on her feet. I sigh loudly and look at Elina, she is blushing a lot and is staring at me.

"Yeah, we are," I say.

I feel Elina taking hold of my hand and suddenly I don't care anymore of what Aeri has to say. I'm just happy. Result screens suddenly pops out infront of us.

-Christmas Miracle Event-

An odd name for an event that isn't even on Christmas day, but I guess it is a miracle we managed to pull through. I am about to speak when a clapping noise starts to grow louder and more frequent. NPCs start surrounding us, clapping and screaming in joy.

"Thanks, heroes!" they yell.

"Thank you so much," says another voice.

We stand in the middle of a crowd that is congratulating us and crying out of joy that we saved their little town. It is an amazing moment, it feels great to play hero.

* * *

It takes a bit for the crowd to settle down, and by a bit I mean like three hours. The inn keeper tells us the inn is still operable in its current state, and after a long fight that's all we want to hear. We wanted to rest and unwind from the sudden epic battle.

The place is badly damaged but the fireplace is lit up and we gather a bunch of chairs to sit and eat lots of food.

"I say we make Owl part of our group," Kayla comments.

Immediately Daath's attention switches to her and he looks like he is about to get pissed.

"That's a good idea," Elina seconds.

"Yeah, what the hell...can't hurt us" I say.

"Have you guys even considered maybe he doesn't want to join?" Daath scolds.

"Actually I wanted to ask if I could join you," says Owl.

Daath and Aeri look at each other quickly and nod.

"Ok, fine," Daath says, "Welcome to our deranged team."

Thank you, chief. Are we really that bad?

"You guys are spectacular. I've never seen such a coordinated and cooperative team in here," Owl says with a smile.

Thank you, recent acquaintance. I knew we weren't that bad.

"Then it has been decided, lets add our new team mate to our party," Kayla suggests.

Daath goes through his menu to send him a message and the box pops up in front of Owl. He accepts quickly and a new and last name for our party appears below Kayla's name.

-Owlman439-

We all sit in silence and Aeri coughs softly. Kayla covers her mouth and starts giggling, trying to keep it discrete she turns her head to the side. Elina's cheeks blow up a little and she starts laughing loudly. Noticing this she covers her mouth and hides her face as well.

"Really? Four thirty nine?" Aeri mutters.

"So there at least four hundred and thirty eight more with your name?" I mock trying not to burst out in laughter.

"I have no idea, it's just been my user name for pretty much everything," he adds without reaction to our laughter.

"How old are you?" Elina asks.

"I am fifteen."

Jaws drop yet again, mine included.

"You are fucking huge," I grunt.

"Yes, I worked out a lot," he responds.

We talk into the night and keep picking at Owl without any response of him. I guess he is the kind of guy you just can't tick off. In a way it is a pretty nice day. We are eating a feast under the open sky…through a broken roof, but under the open sky nevertheless. No matter if Daath and Elina didn't like Christmas it is going to be a good one.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/29/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

This was unbelievably fun to write. Owl is the creation of one of the guys who took the time to favorite and follow my story back when I was first uploading it. Credit still goes to him, thanks a lot wherever you are Terra Booma. I hold Owl dearly in my heart and consider him a strong part of my story.

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Recollection"


	14. Chapter 14 - Recollection

**Chapter 14 - Recollection**

**November/6th/2022**

**Sumiko**

My eyes have been stinging for over an hour now, I really should just turn off my computer and go to sleep.

I laugh a little at my train of thought. Who am I kidding there's no way that's happening, at least not in the next few hours.

It is early in the morning and I didn't sleep one bit. I've been up playing games all night, while I wait for the right time to go out and get another. Sword Art Online. I'm so excited.

I've been so hyped all week that simply saying VRMMORPG brings shivers down my spine, it's exhilarating. Full diving is what has me the most excited. To be completely transferred into a fantastical land simply sounds amazing.

I click my mouse quickly again and again, as my pointer stands over the massive boss of the dungeon. My character moves up and starts cutting it with a small sword in one hand and a shield in the other. She moves swiftly while attacking, but this is merely because of my excellent skills. I smile smugly at the screen and pull a little on the mic attached to my headphones.

"Where is my back up?" I ask changing my voice to a sweet and soft melody.

"Right away, Princess," say a couple of voices in unison.

That's right, I'm a princess and all of you are but my loyal subjects. I smile again and keep attacking the boss, feeling the constant tapping of my finger on the button I start feeling excited. Just a little more, we are almost there.

I browse over the screen and see a spot that should be occupied by a healer on my party empty. It appears one of my loyal guards is not standing where he should be. The boss lifts its massive fists and smashes the ground, creating a shockwave that completely destroys my character and all others in my party. I mute the mic and slam my keyboard with both hands.

"Fuck!" I yell loudly, "Gah! Fucking idiots!"

I simmer down a little and hear some chatter on my headphones.

"Princess, I'm so sorry," someone cries.

I breathe in deeply and switch to my melodic voice once again.

"It's ok, nothing but a simple mistake. Be sure it doesn't occur again please," I say.

Strangling my healer a few times in my mind I keep breathing easily. Playing and online game when virgin boys know you are a girl is just freaking satisfying. Since they have virtually no chance at a girl like me in real life they think being in a virtual worlds ups their chances. It's funny, but also very very pathetic. They will try to do anything to please, they buy you gear, armor, even other games sometimes. It really does payoff to be all nice and sweet to people you will never meet face to face.

I glance at my clock and see I still have a bit to go before I go out of my house. Just a few more minutes Sumiko…just a few more minutes. Whatever little patience I had suddenly disappears.

"Screw this! I'm going to pick up SAO!" I shout into the mic.

"Wait, wait Kay-"

I shut off my computer and stand up. I grab my head and ruffle my own hair a bit. I sigh deeply and move my chair away as I head to my bathroom. My room is rotting mess, maybe I should consider cleaning it up a bit. Perhaps…nah, it's ok the way it is. I reach the bathroom and lift the toilet lid. I sit quickly and go about my business. Looking around I notice something that might be troubling for some people.

"Even my bathroom is a freaking mess," I mutter to myself.

I stand up and flush. I make my way to the sink and open the water tab for a little while, letting the water run I stand idle for a second. The mirror reflects a fun image. My blonde hair is everywhere and my eyes seem baggy as usual but this time around they are also incredibly bloodshot. Strangely enough I have gotten used to this kind of state and no matter what, I find myself sleeping very little every day. I wake up tired and exhausted yes, but I can't go to sleep any earlier anymore. I place my hands in the water and make a little bowl to gather some of the falling water. I lean over a bit and splash my face with cold refreshing water.

I open my mouth and gasp a little as I let the water drip off my face. It's a nice feeling. An alarm in my room suddenly starts making a ruckus. It is time. I grab a towel that was lying on the floor and quickly dry my face as I grab a hoodie that I left on the floor a few days back. I close the water's tab and reach my phone to turn off the alarm. I start getting excited and grab some loose pants from the floor. In a hurry I try to dress and end up tripping as I try pulling my pants up. I start falling face first unto the floor and manage to twist just in time to not hit my face.

"Dammit," I grunt as I roll on my back.

Not wasting a second I pull up the rest and button up the pants.

"Hat…hat…hat?" I murmur looking for the obvious.

Unable to find the one I wanted a settle for a baseball cap lying in my nightstand. I snug it on and pull the hoodie over my head. I can't help but to smile and head to the door of my room almost running.

"Shit! My wallet," I cry as I turn around on my feet.

Making more of a mess in my room I find my wallet under some clothes and quickly bolt off the door. Going down the hallway, the door of my brother's room suddenly props open. Quickly moving to my side, I barely manage to avoid hitting myself with the door.

"Sorry, sis…" he says half-asleep.

Mad and growing impatient, I frown at him.

"Watch it, you dumbnut!" I yell and rush down the stairs.

Hoping my mother won't wake up I pass her room at full speed and jump down the little step before the door of my house. Quickly putting on my shoes I go out the door and into the fresh, cold morning air. I breathe in deeply and smile at the gloomy looking day.

"Just how I like it," I say, grinning at the clouds.

It's a small walk to the bus stop and then a small wait on it, ten to fifteen minutes, it really depends on how punctual the bus-driver is. After that I get off on the stop close to the shops. It takes a bit to walk up and get on the street where all the stores are, but since I'm running it really shouldn't take long. I'm excited, I've been waiting for this game so long.

The big grin in my face is soon erased as I see a long line of people leading to the particular shop of my interest. I sigh in disgust and pull my hoodie down some more. I don't really like being around people...real people.

I get in line and keep my head down as some more guys get in line behind me. I hope not to make a fuzz, in this particular kind of line is not the one where you could expect to see a girl. The guys tend to get excited and ogle frantically if they find out. I soon realize I didn't tuck my hair into the cap, but it is already too late.

"Dude…is that a girl in front of you?" I hear behind me.

Like fucking clockwork. I start getting irritated the longer I stay in line. I don't notice at the start but my foot started tapping against the floor, I'm growing impatient.

"She looks hot…" I hear.

I can feel a frown taking over my face, but I try not to mind it so much, I'm close to the store's entrance which means I'm closer to getting what I came here for and closer to getting the hell out of here.

I stay in line, hearing comment after comment. Perhaps some of them aren't even about me, but the constant muttering behind me is pissing me off.

Just a bit longer Sumiko…just a bit longer.

I have been grinding my teeth for a while now. The person in front of me steps away with a NerveGear and a copy of SAO and I smile widely. Finally. I look inside my pockets and hand the clerk a receipt of my reserved copy. He looks at it for a second and then stares at me.

"Could you show me some id?" he asks.

"What?" I answer, "I come here often, what's the problem?"

"An id. I need to make sure this is your ticket," he insists.

I guess that's what I get from getting a points card here.

"Just give me my stupid game," I mutter.

"What?" the clerk says.

"Nothing, here," I say with a fake smile as I give him my student's card.

He checks my name and then the name on the ticket. He sighs and searches under the counter. He places a boxed NerveGear and a copy of the game on top of it on the counter.

"Here you go. Shouldn't you be at school?" he says after placing the items on a plastic bag.

That's it.

"It's Sunday, you dumbass. Besides shouldn't you mind your own fucking business?" I say somewhat loudly.

I feel everyone in the store staring at me, but I feel incredibly satisfied. The clerk has his hand extended to me with my id. I yank it away from his hand and turn to the line of people staring at me with their mouths open.

"Damn…" someone mutters.

I grab my bag of goodies with my left hand and walk off the store slowly. The eyes of everyone are trained on me but I repress all other impulse to insult anyone else. I exit the crowded store and breathe in deeply again. I look up at the cloudy sky and smile as a single rain drop falls on my cheek.

"Just how I like it…" I mutter again.

I walk to another bus station and wait for a few minutes. I want to get home and play my game, but the ride home is slightly longer. Thankfully I released quite a bit of stress on the nosy clerk, so I can wait just a bit longer.

I arrive home and walk at a fast pace towards the door. I open it and find an unpleasant figure in front of me. A woman with long black hair and brown eyes. It's my mother.

"So, now you run off to god knows where without telling me?" she asks.

I kneel on one knee for a bit to take off my shoes and stare at her with a blank expression.

"Yes," I answer in a flat tone.

She rolls her eyes and looks down on me, angry.

"You need to stop doing this, for your own sake…"she mutters softly.

"Yeah…no," I say and walk past her.

Why is everyone poking their noses into my business it's starting to become really annoying. I'm halfway through the stairs when I hear her voice again.

"What happened to you, Sumiko?" she says. "What happened to my sweet little girl?"

I step back a little and look at her from the first landing in the stairs. What is she trying to do now, guilt trip me?

I can play too, mother.

"I don't know..." I say, breaking my voice intentionally as I look at the ground.

I glance at her briefly and see she is clearly confused. I look up at her with teary eyes and then look down quickly again. Her eyes literally brighten up and she starts getting closer to me.

"Wow, haha! You fall for that?" I answer before she gets any closer and can't help but to start laughing loudly.

Her expression seems sad now, but I turn around and head up stairs to the small hallway where the door to my room and brother's stand. His door again comes ajar and I see the little black haired boy step out of his room. He looks so fragile it almost makes me feel warm inside.

"Why are you always so mean with mom?" he asks.

"Mind your own business," I say harshly as I nudge him away from my path. "She is not even my mother. She is your mother."

I go through my door frame and I feel safe and sound all of the sudden. I sit on my floor leaning against the door and start opening the box containing my NerveGear. I take out the heavy helmet and smile wildly as I stare at every inch of it. This is it, my game.

I stand up with the helmet under my arm and the box of the game in my free hand. I walk to my chair and turn it around to sit on it. Slowly placing the NerveGear near my keyboard I feel myself grinning again.

"It's time for Kayla to be reborn," I mumble to myself.

Another game, another delightful place filled with endless possibilities. Another place filled with adventure that I'll get to experience in full-dive. Another world to not be me.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of July/29/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

Games can be a place of pretend but they are also worlds filled with lies.  
This is sadly the advantage and disadvantage of anonymity.

These chapters are short, yes, but there aren't many so if you don't like how short they are, don't worry.

**Steve The Man:** A sketch of Owl is on the works, just wait for it a while longer.

It's a bit funny how just a few chapters ago I was getting excited over getting over 5 views every day and so far this month you guys have given me over 200 views in just 8 days. THAT'S AMAZING! Thank you guys so much. MAN OH MAN do I have an announcement, this is the last chapter I originally posted back when I was updating my story over two years ago now. THIS MEANS ALL NEW NEVER BEFORE SEEN CONTENT STARTING NEXT WEEK! Are you excited? I really am.

If my story were an anime this is where my first season would end. Let's call it the first Arc of my story. Is it weird that I picture it like that? It probably is.

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Reset"


	15. Chapter 15 - Reset

**Chapter 15.- Reset**

**January/1st/2023**

**Fourth Floor of Aincrad**

**Alshep**

Things did not start well this morning.

Hell, they rarely do. Today was different though, it was worse…

Way worse.

"Al, come on. This is not your problem. There's no need for us to intrude," Owl says with his relaxed tone.

I grab my sword and unsheathe it. People gasp around as I find myself yet in another circle, surrounded by players and NPCs. I am looking at a familiar scenario. There so just happens to be a player who has or perhaps hasn't stolen something from a group of players, and I'm trying to play vigilante again.

"You picking a fight with us, kid?" says a big man in blue and orange attire.

I try not to mind his size and smirk at him. A girl stands on her feet being held harshly against her will by two other men behind the big one.

"Let her go," I grunt and point my sword towards the girl.

"Who are you flailing that sword at?" the big man asks enraged. "We are in a safe zone, you dumbass. You can't hurt us here."

I look back over my shoulder as I can't help it but to smile. I stare for a brief second at Owl, Daath and Elina. They stand just a few feet behind me and I see Daath nodding, Owl shrugging, and Elina shaking her head.

"Oh, haha, I can hotshot," I say with a smirk as I send a duel invite to the large man.

He flinches as the screen pops up in-front of him. I can see him sweat from where I'm standing, my grin gets bigger as I see him hesitate to click the invite. People around are talking to each other and I can't make out anything but murmurs.

"Are these guys for real?"

"Dude…this is crazy. Are they really going to fight?"

The leader of the small group holding the girl finally decides and ends up not accepting my duel. I smile and sheathe my sword. I knew he didn't have it in him. He scrolls through his menu and sends something, but not to me.

The small invite pops up in-front of the girl being held hostage. I grab my sword again and unsheathe it.

"What the hell are you doing?!" I yell.

"Haha, you really think I'm walking out of here without getting what I want?" he replies.

He slowly walks over to the girl that his two men are holding and grabs her hand roughly.

"Did you know that all it takes to operate a menu is the user's hand?" he says as he presses the "accept" button on the girls screen with her finger.

I hear someone shriek in the audience and I start getting close to the girl little by little.

"What the hell do you think you are doing?" Daath yells from behind me.

The man laughs loudly and grabs the girl from her hair. He pulls her around violently and throws her a few feet in front of him. I'm so close, maybe and can grab her and make a run for it. He then unsheathes his blade and pulls the girl on her feet.

"You see boy, in this game it's not about who has the higher level. It's about who is feared the most!" he yells and completely drives his sword through the girl's chest.

The girls screams in panic and starts heaving as the man lifts her up her feet with his sword still protruding out of her chest. She starts crying and screaming for help. Her health points must be dropping madly.

"I don't want to die! Please…help me!" she screams as she cries.

I make a quick dash towards the girl, but the two guys that were holding here earlier step in front of me and push me back, making me trip in the process. I try to move again and intervene, but it is already too late. The girl's body shatters into crystals and the big blue and orange man is declared the winner of an unfair duel. I drop to my knees and drop my sword. People around start to panic and scramble. No one, not even Daath gives chase to the man who just publicly executed a girl in the middle of town.

Shocked I stay on the floor, unsure of what to do. Daath approaches me from behind and tries to get me up on my feet. Not cooperating Owl comes on my other side and lifts me up easily. He picks up my sword and tries to give it to me. I ignore his gesture.

"Come on, Al…let's go back to the inn," he mutters.

I shove him off involuntarily and walk forwards a few steps to where the girl that just died was standing seconds ago. I stare into nothing but air for a couple of seconds and grind my teeth. Someone tugs on my arm and I turn harshly ready to shove them off. Until I see Elina staring at me, frightened.

"I'm...I'm sorry," I mutter and turn away from her.

I kneel again and place my hands on the ground. Just seconds ago someone who is no longer with us was standing right here. For some odd reason I find myself clenching at the dirt with my hands. Trying to fool myself, as if doing it some more would bring that girl back.

"Al…" I hear Elina mutter with a broken tone.

I must look pathetic. I stand slowly and swallow my own spit as I try my best not to scream out of anger. I feel something warm go around my back and freeze on the spot. Perhaps it is the warm feeling, it feels good, but I just don't want to be touched at the moment. Elina is hugging me, trying to comfort me. She knows I am not feeling well. Sadly a hug can only do so much. I turn and gently move her arms off of me. I don't want to be rude, but there isn't really a way to make it look anything other than rude. I smile weakly at her and pat her head gently.

Owl is staring at me from a distance, if I were to guess I would say he is trying to find the right words to say to me. He is good at doing that, lately he has been the one to keep the group in check. Our daily discussions have been toned down and we seem to just get along better than we did before. I get close to him and this time receive my sword from his helping hand, I sheathe it slowly, thoughts of death still plaguing my mind.

"Try not to beat yourself over it, man," he says.

Oddly enough a find myself feeling slightly better, there's something about his tone that seems to put people at ease.

"There's really nothing you could've done about it," he continues.

Suddenly that phrase alone pierces through me like a needle. For some reason I think it hurts more than if he decided to say something else about the matter. I clench my fists and grind my teeth as I walk past him. I can feel how Elina and Owl start following me from a distance. It feels cold, but I don't blame them. After all I am known for being…volatile.

It's a rather short walk back to the inn and I'm already readying myself for what is about to happen. We are going to sit down and chat, we are going to talk about what happened and gear up for another mellow night of nothingness.

I open the door leading inside and quickly sit on the table where I see Kayla is sitting. I slump down on my seat and sigh out loudly.

"Is something the matter?" she asks calmly.

On the corner of my eye I see Daath and Aeri walking over to us, just at the same time Elina and Owl sit close to me. An odd feeling suddenly overwhelms me and I feel like I'm about to burst. It's hard to pin point, but I just want to get out of here. I have a craving to steam off somewhere. The last thing I want to do right now is talk.

"How's everybody holding up?" Daath asks, but his words just rings around in my head like an annoying sound.

I hold my hands to my head and groan as I hold it. Clearly everyone notices and they stare at me with curious expressions. It only helps to make my headache grow stronger. I slam the table with both hands and stand up. Everyone in the inn is now staring at me. More pressure builds up. I look to my right and reach out for Elina's hand. Somewhat harshly I yank her on her feet and start dragging her away with me. I can hear her complaining and shouting, but it's almost as if her complaints brush by me as just background noise. I want to get away, I want to get away from everything. Just for a while.

I barely notice it, but I'm far away from town already. I've been tugging Elina all the way out here, but suddenly she yanks her hand off of my grip. This makes me turn around and just as I do so she slaps me hard across the face.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!"she says with an awfully hard tone.

Surprised, I step back a little as I hold my hand up to my cheek. Both the slap and the way she answers are something new. I can't find the words to answer and I just stand there looking at her like an idiot. My legs give in and I kneel on the ground staring up at her.

"I…I…" is the only thing that manages to come out of my mouth.

She rubs her hand and breathes in deeply as she gets closer to me. Her expression changes from upset to warm and welcoming in a second. She stares at me for a bit and then crouches to be more at my level.

"Look…I won't know what you are feeling if you don't tell me," she mutters softly.

I look away and place my hands on the ground to prop myself a little. I open my mouth but close it quickly as I can't find what to say. Her gaze lingers on me for a few more seconds before she stands up sighing.

"I feel powerless," I say bluntly.

I try to look away, but my eyes are fixated on Elina.

"Is it because of what happened to that girl?" she asks, her tone a little weary because of the subject.

I simple nod and feel how my throat tightens up, making me feel even more uncomfortable.

"You…you can't be feeling bad about that," she says.

Surprised I raise my eyebrow at her. She can't really mean that, not her. Her expression is trying to avoid me as if she really didn't mean what she said.

"You can't be for real…" I huff.

She looks away briefly and then looks at me but she obviously wants to keep avoiding my eyes. My sight drops to the ground and I grasp the dirt over it with my hands, feeling unsure, feeling a sort of dread.

"She is right," I hear in the distance.

I look up and see Daath walking slowly over to us. He looks calm even more so than usual.

"Not you too, man…" I mutter under my own breath.

"Yeah, yeah. The annoying idiot I know is not one to act like a little girl," says another voice.

I divert my eyes a little next to Daath and see Aeri come into view a little behind him. I can't help but to chuckle a bit, but the feeling my throat is still too much for me to throw the insult back to her just like I always do. Elina stands up and quickly Daath and Aeri stand next to her.

"You are not powerless," Elina says softly.

"Yeah, how long has it been? A month? We are still alive," Aeri says with a big smile. "And kicking!"

"Fifty six days," Daath says.

"Whatever, I'm trying to get a point across," Aeri replies.

"And just what the hell is your point?" I ask harshly.

I stand up and turn my back on my friends. I clench my fists and turn around again quickly.

"What the hell is the point?!" I repeat myself.

All three of them look at me with a sad expression. Good job. If I'm good at something is making any moment a bitter one. I know I probably should shut up, but I just keep running my mouth.

"Tell me please what the point is! We live day by day, that's all we do. We live in fear in constant stupid fear!" I yell. "And for what?! So that if we just take a wrong step, or we piss off the wrong people we die? Is that it? Is that the point Aeri?"

She looks at me but then stares at the ground with the most pained expression I have ever seen on her face.

"Do we just stand idly, until someone beats this game for us? Is that even possible? Can we win at all?" I say.

Now I've done it. Daath starts getting close to me. He is mad I can tell, one look is all it takes to see whenever this guy gets mad.

"What now, chief?!" I say loudly.

"You are pathetic," he answers quickly.

Angry I throw a punch at him, he reacts quickly and barely dodging my fist to the side he throws a punch back at me. He hits me square in the face with his fist, which takes me even more by surprise. I fall back on my ass and dumbfounded stare up at him.

"Wasn't it you who told me it was ok as long as it wasn't us?" he asks sounding very irritated, "Are we not ok, Al?"

I want to scream at him, to punch him in return, but instead I just stand up.

"You just don't get it, do you?" I say.

"Then tell me, idiot," he snaps back quickly.

I look at Elina and Aeri, who are standing a few feet behind Daath and then back at him.

"It could've been us…" I groan.

His eyes widen and he just stares at me.

"It could've been Elina, it could've been Aeri, Kayla, Owl…it could've been you," I wail.

Tears run frantically down my face as I raise my head to look him in the eye.

"Do we just stand by as people go crazy?" I ask, "What about the chance you gave me and Elina back when this nightmare started? Do other people don't deserve that?"

He is still staring at me with nothing to say, but I know he is trying to find something to say.

"I'm tired of being a fucking bystander. I'm tired of seeing people die, and I'm terrified of any of you dying."

I can see Elina getting teary eyed and Aeri still refuses to look straight at me.

"Every time I see those stupid crystals of light, from a monster…from another player, I get cold feet man. I want to run away, I want for all of it to be over, but at the same time I want to do something…but I can't," I continue ranting.

"So you want to help people? Is it that simple?" Daath answers.

It's not simple, it will never be, but I'm tired of just staring as everyone stabs each other's backs and forgets death is closely tied to this virtual world.

"We'll think of something. We always do," says yet another distant voice.

I look past everyone and see Kayla riding on Owl's shoulder; the sight is so weird it almost makes me want to laugh. Aeri is finally looking at me and I see Elina is staring straight at me, holding her right hand close to her chest. I finally smile a little though. Owl sets Kayla on the ground and both of them get close to me.

"I didn't know you had feelings," says Aeri with a forced smile.

"Why do you always have to ruin everything?" I reply.

She scratches her head and chuckles loudly. Loudly enough for me to able to hear.

"I get where you are coming from now, Al, but you can't be mourning a stranger," Daath insists.

I close my hands into fists yet again, but ultimately I think he is right.

"Our first and most important priority should always be us, this group," he preaches, "We'll find out a way to help other people, I'm sure of it."

I smile and look at everyone surrounding me. I guess I'm a rather lucky cry baby.

"And just so you know…" Aeri stammers. "My point was that…you are not powerless, you have us. Alone sure, you are powerless alone, but together...together we are strong."

Everyone looks at Aeri briefly and smiles as they turn to look at me. Time to do what I do best I guess.

"Well look at that, you can in fact say nice things from time to time," I say with a big wide smirk.

Everyone starts laughing, even Aeri.

"Don't start crying in front of me ever again, big man," she answers.

"You got it."

Elina walks towards to me and hugs me. I hug her back and then place my hands on her shoulders.

"I'm sorry," I mutter.

She simply smiles at me and nods. Everyone starts walking back to town, but I see that Owl sticks behind a bit.

"Al," he says.

I look at him and he clears his throat loudly.

"I haven't known you for that long, but I can tell."

"You can tell what?" I ask curiously.

"You are good guy, more than you let people on and more than you actually care to show," he says with that calming tone of his, "Believe it or not I think of you to be one of the pillars of this group and as a group whatever burdens you have I think it's only natural for us to share the weight with you. That's what friends are for, right?"

I chuckle to myself and look at Elina who is nodding at all that Owl just said.

"Thanks, mate," I answer.

He smiles widely and turns around to catch up with the others.

"I'll see you at the inn," he yells as he raises his hand.

"I guess we should head back, huh?" I ask Elina.

She takes me hand and starts dragging me along as she starts to get some speed.

"Let's see how you like it," she scoffs.

I laugh and quickly pick her up in my arms. She weighs very little and this is bound to get her flustered.

"Pu…put me down!" she yelps.

I laugh loudly and in a second I already caught up the others. They all laugh and chuckle at Elina's shrieks and complaints.

"Hey, Owl! Catch," I laugh as I move my arms as if I were to throw Elina.

"No, no, no, no!" she quivers as she brings her arms around my neck.

Owl bursts in laughter and so does everyone else. I smile widely, but it slowly disappears off of my face. I'm no longer feeling like I did a few moments ago, but the feeling is still there. I could've done something and I didn't. Everyone is right though, we come first and I should start worrying more about us than some random strangers. A weak smile crawls over my face, it's not much but at least it is genuine. I'm one lucky bastard, to have found such a group. Suddenly I feel Owl's hand resting on my shoulder.

"We'll be alright," he says.

Everyone is looking back at me as he says that, smiling with warms expressions all over their faces.

"Yeah, we will," I reply.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of August/01/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

A group is only as strong as its weakest team member, remember that guys.

MY OH MY, I cannot even begin to tell you how excited I am to finally be dishing out never before seen content! So after a little close to two years of absence here we are! Ready to stick around for long stretch, are you ready? I sure as hell am! Haha. From here on out it's all new, never before seen chapters.

**STEVE &amp; ICO:** You guys make me blush.

Love you all beautiful people, thanks for sticking around with me this far, WE ARE JUST GETTING STARTED! Fun Fact: SAO isn't even in my top 5 favorite animes or light novels. Funny right? If you go to my profile you can find a guide to all the chapters along with some links to art of my characters, please check it out!

As always if you like what you read, please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Unbreakable"


	16. Chapter 16 - Unbreakable

**Chapter 16 - Unbreakable**

**January/2nd/2023**

**Second Floor of Aincrad**

**Daath**

"You are mad, aren't you?" quacks the whiskered girl standing next to me.

"Man, it's so freaking hot on this floor," Al complains as he walks behind me and Argo.

"You really do complain about everything," Owl adds.

They start arguing behind me and soon their voices turn into a nonsensical mumble as I keep walking through the arid mountains.

"Ehhh? You are not going to answer your trusty friend?" Argo says as she places her face uncomfortably close to mine.

"You said this was going to be a unique skill," I retort back at her.

Her face shows some embarrassment, but she quickly erases any trace of it.

"I might've over reacted…" she huffs nervously.

The second floor of Aincrad is home to one of the few extra skills that can be used by multiple players. Unlike most extra skills that happen to be "unique", this one in particular can be obtained by everyone who meets a certain criteria. Which means it's not unique at all, just hard and confusing to get.

"I'm not paying you the next time I need something," I bark.

"What? No, you can't do tha…"

I stare at her with a serious albeit a little scary look and she can't even complete her sentence.

"Uh...I…fine, fine…" she shudders.

"Why are you coming along anyways? It's not normal for a stray like you to be out in the light so much," I say mockingly.

"My, my. You hurt my feelings. Besides if I weren't here you wouldn't be able to find the quest," she replies.

"Sure we can, it's not that hard to find something unusual in the southern edge of this floor," I say yawning.

"Well, then. Let's just say I have some personal interest in how this will play out alright?"

I nod and turn my head slightly to see Owl and Al still arguing about whether if it's hot as hell here or not. I scratch my head and start gazing into the distance in front of me. I see an absurdly big mountain and sigh out deeply.

"Don't tell me…"

"Yep," Argo answers promptly.

I hang my head back and groan loudly.

"Hey, you wanted a unique skill didn't you?"

I look at Argo, feeling very annoyed.

"Yeah, but this isn't one. This is just an extra skill. I'm not complaining, but I wanted something better."

"Woah, aren't you greedy," she says with an annoying smile.

I shake my head and stop walking.

"Al. Owl. Stop arguing already," I insist.

They quiet down quickly and stare at me. I look at Argo and jokingly bow as I extend my arm, as if I were inviting her on stage.

"Right. Right. Right," she says unimpressed. "So, near the top of this mountain you guys will find a hut. Inside is an NPC who will give you a quest for an extra skill."

Al brings his hands together in a clap and rubs them as if he were about get to work.

"Alright!" he says excited.

"Is that it?" Owl asks.

"Yeah, what else did you expect?" Argo responds as if Owl just insulted her.

Owl nods and walks past me and Argo, Al following him close behind.

"That big dude is rude," the girl with whiskers complains.

"He isn't. It just takes a while to get used to him."

She breathes in deeply and gazes at the mountain.

"It's quite the climb," she states.

"Sure, looks like so," I answer.

"Hey, so where's the rest of your group Daath? You have three girls in your group if I'm not mistaken."

"They didn't want to partake in this for whatever reason. They stayed back in Lobria."

She ponders for a second and then dumbfounded stares at me.

"Are you guys slacking or something? People are already near the twentieth floor," she says, "Wait, what level are you right now?"

"Seventeen, what of it?"

She looks almost disappointed as I say this.

"Almost your entire group participated in the first boss event. I guess I just figured you guys would've wanted to stay on top of things," she confesses.

I laugh and start walking once again towards the big mountain.

"It's too dangerous. I don't want to be a hero, I just want to survive."

This gets me thinking back at yesterday's…episode. I catch up to Al quickly and for some reason feel the urgent need to stop him on his tracks.

"What's up, man?" he asks.

"You doing any better?" I ask.

He looks at the floor briefly and then back to me. He breathes in and out loudly too.

"As much as I can be…still can't say exactly what got me yesterday…" he mumbles.

I place my hand on his shoulder and pat it reassuringly. He pushes my hand away and chuckles.

"Don't get too soft with me, chief," he jokes.

Quickly he runs in front of Owl, he turns around as he walks and places his hand around his mouth as he keeps going.

"Hey! I'll race you all to the top!" he yells, "I bet you all four thousand Col!"

As soon as he says that I see Argo sprint past Owl and Owl quickly following suit. I start jogging and quickly enough I'm doing a full sprint at Al who finds himself surprised and panics as he turns around to see if he can catch up to Owl. I run past him in just a few seconds and find myself laughing hysterically.

* * *

"That's one hell of a way to lose a bet," Argo teases as she stretches slowly.

I'm still trying to catch my breath, Owl runs too fast for a guy his size. He stands there doing nothing, not even gasping for air. He looks around for a second, the hut Argo was talking about stands behind him and next to a giant rock. The rock looks odd alright.

"Hey now…that's not fair." says Al as he reaches us, heaving.

"Money. Money. Money, please," Argo mocks as she extends her hand right in Al's face.

He grunts loudly and accesses his menu to make a transfer. He looks annoyed, but he is prioritizing getting air into his lungs. Argo celebrates as she is paid but I turn my attention to the hut.

"So, how do extra skills work?" Owl asks me.

"Just like regular skills, but they're more…diverse." I mutter finding myself confused by my own wording.

Owl nods and turns around to look at Al. This guy never needs too much of an explanation, that's good.

"Hey, come on," he says as he beckons him over.

Al quickly walks over to us and we enter the small hut one after the other. An NPC sits inside. I approach him slowly and talk to him.

"So you've finally heard about me," says the man.

I stand back a bit confused and look at Argo as she enters the hut.

"Never mind the nonsensical dialogue I just didn't take you to the other NPC who informs you of this quest," she says.

"You like cutting as much corners as you can," I huff.

She chuckles and sticks her tongue out at me.

"In order to become powerful you will need to undergo hard training," the NPC says as he stands up.

He exits the hut and we follow behind him. It is at this point that I notice just how quiet this mountain is. I can hear the breeze, that's how quiet it is. As we exit the hut I look around and gaze at the nearby trees to see if there is something else around. I come up with nothing, nothing but some trees and big view of floor two, I can even see Urbus in the distance. The man stops in front of the big odd rock I spotted earlier.

"You will need to break this rock," the NPC says as he rests his open palm on the massive thing.

Both Al and Owl look at each other and break out their weapons.

"Let's do this," says Al, sounding giddy.

"With your bare hands," the NPC adds.

Al drops his sword with a "what?" and Owl simply shrugs as he puts away his spear and shield. He then even puts away his armor in his inventory. Surprised I look at the hulking mass of muscle this fifteen year old is.

"Christ, how often did you hit the gym back in the real world?" I ask.

"Often," he says simply.

I chuckle and put away my armor and weapons as well. I feel less burdened that's for sure. I stretch my arms and pat my shoulder as I get closer to Owl. Al puts his sword in his inventory and sighs loudly as he puts away his heavy armor. Even if Aeri teases the poor guy he is not as fat as Aeri makes it sound or perhaps it's the contrast of seeing with him with and without the armor. I shrug and look at the NPC who is getting closer to us.

"Now, I will brand you until you finish this test of strength," he says as he dips three of his finger in a small tub of something he takes out of his robe.

"Wha…hey!" All exclaims as the man rubs something on his face.

Owl even bends he knees a little so the NPC can smear whatever he is holding in his face and I stand there awkwardly as the man does the same to me. After he is done I look at Owl and Al and see an all too familiar face paint smeared on their cheeks. I turn to Argo and see her grabbing at her own stomach as she laughs hysterically. Her eyes teary from laughter she points at us with her finger and laughs so much she falls on her own butt. So this is why she wanted to stay.

"So, this is where you got your damn whiskers from?" I ask as I cross my arms.

She nods at me but can't keep herself from laughing.

"You guys look ridiculous," she says as she catches her breath.

Al licks his thumb and tries to rub the paint off but to no avail he doesn't even smear it further.

"This is quick drying paint, adventurers. I will only remove it once you pass my test," the NPC says as he retreats to his hut.

"What the hell," Al grunts sounding annoyed and quickly turns to the rock, "Fine Fine! Let's be done with this!"

He runs towards it and punches it with a bit of a running start. His fist connects with the rock and only the sound of his bone hitting the solid surface is heard throughout the mountain. He freezes on the spot for a second or two before jump back rubbing the top of his knuckles.

"Damn, that almost hurt," he howls.

He quickly gets close to the rock again and as he screams he starts to repeatedly hit the rock with his closed fist.

"You have fun with this," Argo says as she turns her back on us.

"Hey, did you finish this quest?" Owl asks before she heads down the mountain.

Argo turns around as she walks and points with both of her index fingers at her cheeks.

"I still have the whiskers," she says before she disappears from our sight.

"So…no," I hear Owl mutter.

Al is still hard at punching the rock straight on. He yells with each punch and even takes a step back to then take a step in as he punches.

"What did he say…bare hands? Bare hands, yeah!" Al exclaims as he talks to himself.

He then opens his palm and his hands faintly flash blue for a second. His open palm connects with the stone and it gently shakes as he hits it. Surprised, he stands back and looks at his hands. So that's how it is.

"Hey, Al, stop for a second. I don't think we can break this thing just now," I say.

"What do you mean, I did something just now."

I sigh and look at Al unimpressed, if I sometimes get hot headed he is just three steps in front of me every time.

"Go ahead then, hit it again," I mumble.

He gives me a smirk and turns around, striking a karate-like pose with his palms open. He breathes in deeply and screams loudly as his hands flash briefly again and he strikes the rock. It barely moves this time.

"What the hell…" he grunts.

He then screams loudly again and starts to hit the stone, one blow after the other in quick succession. His hands become a barrage of on and off lights as he hits the rock. After a few seconds he backs away, catching his breath.

"Told you," I say smugly.

He practically hisses at me and proceeds to sit on the ground where he stands. I turn my head to see Owl. I can tell he is deep thought. He is rubbing his chin with his index finger and thumb. I'm about to open my mouth when he speaks.

"Maybe…we have to train unarmed combat? It would seem that it's some sort of dormant skill, isn't it?" he says calmly.

I smile widely and nod.

"You should be the leader of our group," I say.

He shakes his hands and raises both of them around his chest.

"I'm really, positively ill-suited for something like that," he answers with a worried look.

I nod and chuckle slightly.

"Alright, alright."

Al gets up and pats down his trousers, he stretches a bit and clears his throat.

"So what? We go down this mountain and start punching wasps?" he says jokingly.

Owl looks at me and I stare him back in the eye, this lasts a few seconds and then we both smile, mischievously. Al clearly notices this.

"You guys can't be for real…"

* * *

**January/5th/2023**

It really helped that we were on just the second floor of Aincrad, regular mobs were quite easy to beat bare handed albeit a little time consuming. We tried going at it with fisticuffs with different kind of enemies. Small lizard men proved too dangerous since they never ever dropped their swords no matter how hard we hit them. The damage output of our hands themselves was going up but against a sword an open palm can only get you so far. We stuck to wasps since they have to get quiet close to try and sting you. They are quite massive but once they are close they were easy to strike down and basically beat to a pulp. We had to stock up on health and antidote potions beforehand though.

"I got you," Owl huffs.

I turn around just in time to see him slam a wasp harshly into the ground. After doing so he quickly stands back and waits for the wasp to try to get up. Just as the insect is trying to catch flight again, Owl strikes it hard across its thorax. The wasp is knocked back a few feet and tumbles into the ground.

"Al, switch!" Owl commands.

Al dashes next to Owl and jumps into the air as he approaches the wasp. He lets out a loud battle cry and his hands flash significantly longer than they did back at the rock. He crashes down into the wasp with an open palm and immediately the insect bursts into light. He laughs calmly and stands up cracking his knuckles.

"Piece of cake," he mutters.

The result screens pop up and both Owl and Al discard them without even looking. I don't blame them we've been at it for three days now. I sit on a stump and take a flask out of my inventory.

"Oh no, Daath has resorted to drinking. What are we going to do?" Al says sarcastically.

"I just feel thirsty…" I say trying to explain myself.

Owl walks up to me and takes out a health potion which he downs quickly. He sighs and hangs his head for a brief second.

"This works just as well," he states.

"Yeah, but it's wasting a resource," I snap back.

He nods and almost looks apologetic. Al walks up to us, looking confused as he scratches his back.

"But it's like impossible to feel thirsty…" he mumbles.

He is right, but I can't help but to want to feel some cold drink going down my throat. Owl acknowledges Al and we find ourselves in an awkward moment of silence. Al coughs loudly and just in time a few seconds later.

"So…you guys think we can crack that rock already?" he asks, "I really want to get back today."

"I'm sure Elina misses you too," I say teasingly.

He looks away and scratches his nose.

"Yeah, yeah…" he mumbles.

I stand up and pat Owl on the shoulder.

"Let's get going then."

* * *

It was no surprise when Owl was the first to crack the hulking stone in two but it was when Al was the second to do so and even more so when I found myself at my fifth attempt at trying to crack the damn thing.

"Come on, man. Just concentrate," Al cheers behind my back.

"Yeah, if he can do it, it should be a breeze for you," Owl echoes.

"Hey, that's hurtful," Al complains.

I laugh in my head and breathe in deeply as I strike a pose. My left arm extended towards the big rock, my bare palm just a few inches away from its surface. My right hand is right next to my stomach, I slowly let the air out of my lungs and then quickly slam my right palm into the stone. It shakes violently but it doesn't even crack. Frustrated I yell as I start hitting it fast and repeatedly. My palm slams punishingly against the thing, one blow after the other. I jump back and then start taking a few steps back.

"Oh, he is pissed now," Al huffs.

Damn right I am. I start running towards the stone and swinging my upper body back I prepare to slingshot my right side to slam my hand as hard as I can against the stone. I yell as loudly as I can and my hand finally makes contact. My breathing became a big ragged but my ears catch a sweet cracking noise. The damn stone finally splits in two and I can't help it but to jump in joy with my fist in the air.

"Well done, all three of you," says the NPC.

He then approaches me and wipes the whiskers off of my face. I smile and the result screen of the quest appears before saying it has been cleared, and that I have gained the Martial Arts extra skill. All of the sudden I receive a message.

-From: Aeri  
-To: Daath  
-Subject: …  
-Message: We have a problem.

Curious I press the reply command and start typing out a message when catch a glance of Al's expression. It is one of fear and dread.

"Al…you ok?" I ask.

He stays frozen in place looking at an entry in his friends menu. With more careful examination I can see Elina's name backwards because of the angle I'm looking at Al from. Some long name is written below hers which would usually mean her location, this is followed by what floor she is on. It suddenly makes sense to me why Al is looking the he is.

"Elina is on floor eighteen…" he answers.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of August/01/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

I had the idea to write down this chapter after the longest research on skills around the world of SAO. If I take pride of anything in this little story of mine is that I do my research and would hate it if my story wasn't true to the source material. Extra skills are not all the time unique and this is something I will play around with in later chapters. For some reason, I feel that this chapter feels sort of like filler? I don't know you guys tell me. I try to keep all chapters entertaining and for them to actually develop the story further. Anyways, just rambling here (I will some more so please forgive me).

Thanks again for bearing through my writing, hope to see that more of you enjoy my story this week. EVEN MORE SO THAT I'M 35 VIEWS SHY OF REACHING A 1000! Thank you guys so much! It really fills me with glee that even when my story is out of the first page people still dig through to open up my story. Maybe they are re-reads, maybe they are new people just discovering my story. EITHER WAY! I'm so happy and want to thank you guys a bunch. Thank you readers, thank you for your encouraging reviews, thank you Donna for keeping up with my antics and me in general. Just thank you all. I hope to keep you all entertained in the future and if you are just reading up on my story, stick around, I might just surprise you.

As always if you like what you read, please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "Substandard"


	17. Chapter 17 - Substandard

**Chapter 17 - Substandard**

**January/5th/2023**

**Fourth Floor of Aincrad - Lobria**

**Elina**

It has been a while since Al and the others went back to the second floor. A few days actually.

I look up at the sky to see the clouds slowly passing by and breathe out slowly. It still bothers me how each floor has its own sky. I mean you can still see the next floor just above, but there are clouds and other stuff that feel surreal. It's silly to think so though, this is a game after all. Just a little pet peeve I have. I look down, I'm sitting on the edge of the fountain in the main plaza of the town. I drop my hand and slowly dip it into the water. It still feels odd, gooey. I wish it felt like real water. Distraught, I take my hand out of the water and stare at it, it's wet. Do I even remember what real water really feels like?

"Daydreaming?"

I turn around, Aeri is standing next to me. I shake my head and sit facing her. She holds her hands behind her back and smiles as she leans a bit over me. Ever so gracefully I wipe my hand on my top.

"I didn't see you back at the inn. I thought you would be here," she says.

"I got tired of the inn and I want to do something else," I answer.

She sits beside me and supports herself by placing both of her hands on the edge of the fountain. She closes her eyes as the sun briefly touches her skin before hiding back in the clouds.

"Have you tried raising some non-combat skills?" she says.

This catches a bit of my attention. I have been trying some different skills lately. I have been fishing, sewing and even playing music. I bring up my inventory and quickly browse over to the flute I got off a merchant back on floor three. Through the slightly see through interface of the inventory I can see Aeri smiling at me. I discard the menu quickly once I notice this.

"Yes, I can make really neat clothes now," I answer.

She nods at me and she opens her menu.

"I really haven't done anything other than raise my combat skills…" she mumbles as she looks at her stats.

"You two are bound to give me a heart attack."

Both Aeri and I turn our heads to the side and see Kayla slowly approaching us, her arms crossed, she is pouting and shaking her head.

"Before running off to god knows where, you two should tell me where you are going," she exclaims like a worried mom.

"Relax, you can check where we are in your friends menu," Aeri says, brushing her off.

Kayla stares at her with that stern look only she can give, it's really odd to see her mad or upset at something, so whenever she does get upset or something it makes you feel quite guilty, and quickly enough like a scolded kid Aeri responds.

"Geez…ok, sorry. We'll be sure to tell you next time."

Kayla looks pleased and sits next to me. She places her hand on my shoulder and rubs it gently, like giving me a massage, she is touchy feely like that.

"How are you holding up?" she asks.

"I'm alright, I want everyone to come back already though."

She chuckles and looks at me with a mischievous grin.

"You miss him that much already?" she teases.

I smile and bring up my menu, I then bring up my messages and move my body a little to let her see. I have over seven messages from Al, all of them sent in just the few days they've been gone. Kayla chuckles and I feel Aeri resting her weight on my side to peek at my menu.

"Alright, so he misses you more," Kayla adds while laughing a little.

I nod and dismiss the menu.

"I'm just getting a bit bored…" I retort.

I stand up quickly and jump around to face Kayla and Aeri that are now sitting almost side to side to each other.

"What if…we go hunting?! We could do some quests on our own or something, right?" I propose.

Kayla and Aeri exchange looks and suddenly I find myself deeply bothered by their expressions. They react as if just told them a joke or something.

"Come on now, really?" Aeri replies.

I find myself lacking in words a little, her tone and both of their expressions really bother me.

"Ye-yeah," I struggle.

They look at each other again, but this time Aeri laughs a little, she covers her mouth quickly enough and clears her throat.

"Sweetie, we are…quite a few levels above your own," Kayla responds.

That was no normal reply it feels almost as if she is mocking me. I clench the ends of my sleeves and press my teeth against each other. I must've misheard or something.

"Yeah, I'm level seventeen. You are what uh…" Aeri says as she brings up her menu, "Fourteen."

"What does that have to do with anything?" I ask raising my own voice.

Kayla's eyes suddenly widen and she turns quickly to Aeri, she moves as if trying to stop Aeri from doing something but it's already too late.

"You are weak."

The three words start echoing in my head, very, very loudly. Kayla slaps Aeri over the head harshly and stands up. She walks towards me but I walk away as she tries to get close.

"Dear, I'm sure she didn't mean it like that…" Kayla says wearily.

I keep taking steps back and feel my eyes getting teary, but for once another feeling is stronger than that of sadness.

"Fine! I don't' need you!" I yell.

They stare at me awe struck, I'm surprised myself. Kayla tries again to reach out for me but this time I slap her hand away. I feel guilty right the second I do so but I don't apologize. I simply turn around and start running towards the inn. I can hear Kayla running after me, she is trying to get me to stop.

"Sweetie, come on. She didn't mean it," she says.

I just keep running, I hit the door to the in running and make a fast dash towards the stairs. I go up, almost tripping, I use my hands to stop me from doing so. I look back quickly as I reach the top of the stairs, Aeri barges in with Kayla.

"I'm sorry, Eli," Aeri says out of breath.

Once again, I ignore them and get to my room. I slam the door behind me and lock it. I lean on the door and slide down all the way till I'm sitting. I hear footsteps on the other side, followed by their voices.

"Now you really have done it!" Kayla scolds Aeri.

"I…I didn't mean it," Aeri replies.

They knock on my door and call for me several times, I sit there as I feel the knocks they make on the door vibrate slightly on my back. I swipe my hand into thin air, bringing up my menu. I hover over to my messages quickly and bring up a reply to Al's messages. I'm in the middle of typing out a message when Aeri's words start echoing again in my head. I bite my lip a little and dismiss my menu as I look at the open window in the other side of the room.

"I'm not weak…" I mumble.

I get up on my feet and move quickly to the chest that is located next to the window. I open it and take out my weapons. My short sword and buckler, a gift from Al back when we started. They are not the same as before though, Daath taught me the basics of upgrading so I've been gathering Col and materials to make them better since. My blade stands at its plus nine upgrade it's pretty powerful and my buckler isn't far behind at eight. Over all it gives me great attack points and a strong defense. I search through my stored stuff some more and take about seven health potions with me. I store them in my inventory and sheathe my sword. I secure the buckler on my fore arm and walk over to the door again.

I can hear Kayla and Aeri talking outside, Kayla is still talking Aeri down. I find it hypocritical. It's true she didn't actually say anything but her expression and reactions back at the fountain only meant she thought the same. I look towards the window again and breathe in deeply. I bring up my inventory and scroll through some pieces of heavy armor I've acquired. I never really wore any heavy armor so far. It makes me feel bulky and slow but if I'm going to do this I better put it on. I equip all the pieces I've gathered and my leather armor starts shining. Shoulder plates and a red chest plate appear over my normal clothes. I look down and bend a little to tap my newly equipped knee-guards. I then equip a long black cloak, it covers my armor completely and only my face is uncovered unless I decide to put the hood on.

I glance at the window one last time. I nod to myself and start running towards it. Just as I approach it I jump and I fly briefly through the air into the slightly crowded town street. I get to the floor and roll as soon as my feet make contact. I manage to cushion the fall but I'm not dexterous enough to roll out of the fall and find myself still on the ground once I stop rolling.

"Wow, are you crazy?" someone says as I get up on my feet.

I look at the guy who commented on my fall and quickly put my hood on. I feel exhilarated, I run to Lobria's floor gate and stop to catch my breath. I nervously look around, there's no way Aeri and Kayla know I am out of my room. Not until I do this that is. I bring up my menu and take myself out of the party Kayla and Aeri made with me when the guys left. My heart stops for a brief moment as I see Kayla's and Aeri's names disappear from under mine. I start breathing in and out fast but I'm more excited than concerned or sacred. I approach the gate and interact with it, this makes the floor menu pop out. I see all the floors that are unlocked, all the way to floor nineteen. I hover my finger over the last floor but suddenly feel my knees shaking. I shake my head quickly and go down one floor to eighteen. I press it and light blinds me for a second as I appear on another place. The sound of people talking is louder than back at Lobria. I look around and see tons of people, players and NPCs walking around everywhere, vendors shouting from their mats and even some other players singing and playing instruments not too far away from me.

I breathe in deeply, the air is quite cold and unlike Lobria, the sky is crowded with white fluffy clouds enough to cast shadows all over the place but still the sun shines through brightly. I start walking down the crowded street, seeing so many faces is quite baffling for me, the noise too. It feels just like the shopping districts back in the real world. I take off my hood and start smelling delicious food. It's different though it's quite different. I follow my nose to a nearby stand and see a girl flipping takoyaki in a pan. This can't be, there's real world food here?! I find myself staring as the girl flips the octopus balls on the molds inside the pan.

"Hi! Are you hungry?" she says.

I look straight at her nodding and sit down on a stool. I swipe my hand at her but no menu comes up. She looks at me with a confused expression but then laughs.

"Oh god, you think I'm an NPC?" she asks.

I nod again, feeling quite confused. She laughs briefly and places an order of takoyaki on a plate. She passes it to me and pours more batter into the pan.

"I'm a player, just like you. That'll be three hundred Col by the way," she adds with a smile.

I transfer the amount Col to her and grab a food pick from the little container in front of me to start eating but stop myself.

"I didn't know you could…" I find myself with no words.

The girl starts turning the batter around and stops for a brief second to wipe her brow.

"Cook? Set up shop?" she says.

I nod, I really can't come up with anything else to say.

"Well there's a vast array of skills you can develop here," she utters, "And a whole 'nother ton of stuff you can do within the games parameters."

She brings up a menu I never seen before and fiddles around with a few options within a grid in it. She then extends her hand over the pan. She rubs her index finger and her thumb together and from between them falls something that looks exactly like green onion.

"Cooking, sewing, woodcrafting," she says softly and looks over to the fountain down the street, "you can learn how to play instruments and even become a blacksmith."

I look down the street to notice both blacksmiths in their mats and players playing instruments.

"Metalworking, you can even increase mining and gathering skills," she says as she keeps cooking, "I heard someone say the number of skills within this world is unlimited."

She looks at me calmly and sets another order of takoyaki in a plate. She then sets it to her side and grabs a food pick herself.

"Come on now, try this batch with me, before it goes cold," she hums as she pierces a ball and brings it up to her mouth to gently blow on it.

I do the same, I can feel how hot the food is just by holding it close to my face, it smells just like the takoyaki my father used to make for me. I smile widely at the nostalgic smell and after blowing on it slightly I put the whole thing in my mouth. As soon as I start chewing on it I notice it doesn't taste quite right. I look over at the girl and see her with a sour expression herself. She chews her portion rather quickly and swallows it as if were a pill. I do the same and stare at her for a few seconds.

"It…doesn't taste like takoyaki…" I mutter.

She nods and bows at me looking apologetic.

"I'm so sorry I thought this time I was going to get the flavor right," she retorts. "I got the smell right though, didn't I?"

I nod with a smile but at the same time I'm confused.

"You see," she says and brings up that weird menu again. "I have to mess around in this dumb grid to mix ingredients and stuff like that. I managed to make the batter and stuff like that work, but I can't seem to get the octopus or flour right."

It's like she can read my mind. I look down at my food and decide to keep eating it. It's not like it tastes bad, it's just not the right taste. It smells amazing and I already paid for it so I figure I might as well eat it. She chuckles a little and I see her fiddle around in that menu some more.

"You are the first to not leave after they realize it doesn't taste the same as in the real world."

I finish swallowing the fourth ball and wipe my mouth with my sleeve.

"It doesn't taste bad," I say. "It just doesn't taste like takoyaki, I think you almost got it though."

She smiles and a small jar materializes in her hand. She tilts it over and pours more batter over the pan.

"I'll get there," she says while smiling.

I finish up what's on my plate and hand it over to her empty. She bows again like the people back in the real world did in these stands and smiles at me fondly.

"Be sure to come back sometime soon, I'll get it right next time you come," she says.

"I'll be sure to come back then," I say while smiling.

She bows at me some more and I start making my way further down the streets. What she said had opened my eyes. I see people on mats, yelling, trying to catch people's attention. If I hadn't stumbled with that takoyaki girl I wouldn't be as observant as I am now. I can see cursors over their heads. It makes me smile for some reason.

"Weapon repairs and armor forging here!" a guy on a mat yells. "I do the best repairs in floor eighteen!"

Why had we been staying back all this time? These floors are great, they are so lively, filled with people doing something else than fighting. It makes me really excited to think of the possibilities. Suddenly I receive a message. It's from Kayla but I don't even bother with opening it. With her message bringing me back to my first objective I start heading out of town. I came up here to get stronger, I need to get stronger. I put my cloak back in my inventory and unsheathe my sword as I step out of the safe zone. This floor looks like a marshland, small plots of land scatter across small river-like patches. Some weird flying creatures are scattered through what I can see over in the distance. On the far back the flora gets thicker and some kind of forest can be seen way in the back.

I start walking in a straight line, the floor feels uneven and squishy I gotta say it's a new sensation for me. I keep walking for a while and notice the ground get all muddy, nothing too annoying but it makes me walk a bit slower. I approach one of the flying creatures, up close it looks like a gigantic fly, it has weird hair all over its body and its eyes are huge and appear to have a pattern over them. I also take a look at the cursor above it. It's purple. As I see this I tighten the grip around my sword and bring my buckler up. It's just one…I can manage.

I place myself in front of it and wait for it to notice me, It does so quickly and slowly hovers in my direction. As soon as it gets close I slap it with my buckler and pierce through it with my sword. This reduces its health by a quarter, yeah I can do this on my own. I stand back a little and my sword glows blue. I side step as it gets closer to me and start slashing at it as fast as I can, as many times as I can. I count up to thirteen slashes and slap the thing away with my buckler as I jump back. It is now a quarter away from dying.

"Yes," I say as I prepare another sword skill.

I'm about to jump in to deliver the final blow when I see the fly's eyes glow red. It flies quickly at me and pushes me with its body. I fall on my back but try to stand up as quickly as possible. Once I do I'm surrounded by flies. My knees shake where I stand and I drop my sword. They start closing on me when they all suddenly disappear in a burst of light. A result screen pops up in front of me, giving me a lot of Col and experience. I glance around quickly and notice a man and a woman walking towards me, they are both sheathing their weapons. I fall to my knees and let out a soft sob. That was too close. I open my eyes and see that I am already level fifteen. These enemies were too much for me to handle and yet I got experience for only fighting them a brief moment.

"Hey are you alright?" says the man.

"What are you doing here all by yourself? This marsh is rather dangerous alone," asks the woman.

I look up and see them both, I'm surprised as I notice how similar they are. They have the same factions and the exact same black hair tone. Both of them have brown eyes and stand around the same height. They must be twins. The woman comes closer and picks up my sword, she then approaches me and gives me a hand so I can stand up. With her help I get up and she gives me my sword back.

"I'm Reika," she says with a smile.

"And I'm Ryuji," says the man as he walks next to the woman.

"I…I'm Elina…" I mutter.

* * *

"I see," Ryuji mumbles in deep thought.

It takes me little time to explain why I'm here so under-leveled. Ryuji says that it was quite a dumb move but Reika sympathizes with me and even hugs me after I finish telling my story. It turns out they are twins, I feel great that I managed to get that right. They are both level twenty one which I find really, really impressive since I thought Daath was among the strongest players I knew.

"I still think it was sort of a dumb move," he says, "your party must be looking like crazy for you."

"I'm not even sure if they are looking for me," I mutter quietly.

Reika comes close to me and hugs me tightly again.

"You poor, cute, little thing," she says.

I feel very embarrassed as she hugs me but I don't want to push her away, it's kind of nice.

"We'll help you level up a little," Reika says while still hugging me.

"We will…?" says Ryuji.

"You will?!" I add excited.

Reika nods cheerfully and I see Ryuji sighing deeply behind her. He nods as well and smiles briefly. He starts walking towards the trees and Reika stops hugging me to follow him. I stay where I'm standing for a second, unsure of what to do.

"Come on," Reika says as she beckons me over.

I catch up to her and move my shoulders to adjust the shoulder plates a bit. I grunt while doing so, they feel a bit uncomfortable.

"Not used to heavy armor?" she asks.

I nod and see she pats her hard leader pads on her chest and shoulder.

"This is just as good, you just need to upgrade, although I recommend doing armor upgrades yourself," she explains.

"Don't ever let blacksmiths handle armor, ever," says Ryuji as he leads us through the marsh.

Reika laughs and catches up to Ryuji, she jumps on his back and starts messing with his hair. Ryuji complains a bit and tries to get her off.

"You don't have to be all grumpy, we are just helping her out a little," Reika huffs.

"Yeah, yeah," Ryuji croons.

I smile a bit, it's nice to see that other people can be nice. The last month has been a barrage of bad things, the fact that I just happened to be saved by these two was really nice. They look close too, I guess that's just twins for you. They forcefully tease each other but both of them are smiling.

"Just into this woods you can find lower leveled enemies, which is kind of a cheap shot sin-" Ryuji starts saying but Reika pulls me to the side.

"He gets all fired up when talking to anything related to the game's mechanics and other stuff like that," she whispers next to my ear.

I look ahead and see him still rambling on about how cheap it is that the enemies near town are harder to kill than whatever is on the marsh woods. He then starts talking about his weapon stats and how mad he is they turned out the way they turned out.

"I'm telling you, having no durability on this blade is the absolute worst. I have to be fixing it every time," he rants, "but I guess that's what I get for having this 5H3Q build."

"Plus five heaviness and plus three quickness, right?" I question.

Ryuji turns slightly to me and smiles.

"There we go! Someone who actually understands what I'm talking about!" he sings out.

Reika stares at me a little confused and scratches her nose briefly.

"You really understand that number and letter mumbo jumbo?" she asks.

I nod quickly and bring up my blade.

"I got 3S1A2D on this one," I comment.

Reika looks at me perplexed but Ryuji quickly hangs back to stare at my blade.

"No way! You found a blacksmith to put both accuracy and sharpness in one build?" he asks excited.

I nod with a smile and sheathe the small blade.

"There's a blacksmith in floor four that is really really skilled," I add.

"How do you know about this stuff?" Reika asks. "You got all this knowledge yet you are under-leveled, it's weird."

I shrug briefly and let my shoulders down a bit as I think of Daath. I wonder where he is briefly and remind myself of how I practically ran away from everyone today.

"I have a friend, he's taught me a lot of stuff," I say softly.

Reika stares at me with examining eyes. She then smiles and pats my head. Yet another expression I'm used to but like the hug I don't exactly mind it right now.

"Sounds like you have good friends," they say at the same time.

They look at each other and laugh it off as they keep walking.

"That happens often," they say, again at the same time.

They glance at each other again and laugh even louder. I laugh as well and bring up my menu out of curiosity. I move over to my messages tab and suddenly feel a bit scared.

-From: Alshep  
-To: Elina  
-Subject: …  
-Message: You are not safe, I'm coming to get you.

Just as I finish reading this I notice Al sent it over an hour ago. I look around almost panicking, but don't see anything that looks dangerous until I look forwards that is. Ryuji and Reika have their swords out and they are pointing them at a group of players with orange cursors over their heads. With my hand shaking I reach for my sword and pull it out to point it at them.

"Are you three alone or are there more of you nearby?" asks a woman with a long sword standing opposite of us.

Out of the group of players she is the only one with a green cursor. I start examining the other players in front of us and see that they are all heavily armed. Two guys carry two handed swords and are staring us down with ill motives. The woman and another girl hold long swords and finally a man the size of Owl holds a battle hammer.

"What difference does it make?" Ryuji asks.

"The differences here is if we whether just rob you or if we rob you and then kill you," the woman says.

"It's just us three…" Reika adds.

The woman smiles and sheathes her sword slowly. She laughs out loud sounding like a maniac and gets closer to Ryuji. She gets a little of her flashy red hair past her ear and smugly gives us a grin.

"Alrighty then, we'll just rob you," the woman states, "now hand over all of your Col."

The woman comes close to Ryuji and puts her right hand on her hip.

"Now, now, I don't have all day," she miffs.

Even with his back turned I can tell Ryuji is mad, he swipes up with his hand and his menu comes up. He hesitates a bit but he quickly goes over the transfer menu.

"Eli!" someone shouts from behind.

Suddenly time slows down, I turn around and see Aeri running full speed at me. I turn again quickly and see the woman unsheathing her sword. Ryuji is still going through his menu, he is defenseless. Then someone jumps out from the nearby trees and grabs me, it's Al.

"Grab this!" he orders me as he places a blue crystal in hand.

After doing so he pushes me back and I feel Aeri grab hold of me before I trip. I look forwards and Al is unsheathing his sword just as I can see Reika trying to make a run towards Ryuji. Aeri turns me around harshly, she holds a crystal in her hand as well.

"Quickly, grab yours and teleport to Taft!" she says.

"H...how?!" I ask.

Al is blocking attacks from the man with the hammer. I get a knot in my throat as I can no longer see Reika or Ryuji.

"Say teleport and then say Taft, now Elina!" Aeri screams.

I look down at my hands and hold the crystal tightly with both hands.

"Teleport, Taft!" I yell as I close my eyes.

* * *

**Eighteenth Floor of Aincrad**

**Alshep**

"Aeri go back now!" I scream as I swipe my sword at the man's hammer, perfectly parrying it.

"What about you idiot?!" she asks.

"I've got this don't worry!" I reply and jump back avoiding the man's hammer.

"Teleport, Taft!" Aeri yells behind me.

I suddenly relax and look over to my left to spot a black haired girl who is being attacked by the same guys that started attacking me. I bring up my left hand holding a crystal and hold it tightly. I push it back into my pocket and see that I still have another two stuffed in there. I nod to myself and roll forwards, avoiding the guy's hammer as I do so, and reaching the black haired girl in the process. I pull her into safety just as she is to be attacked on her flank. I place a crystal in her hands and push her behind.

"Go! Teleport to Taft, now!" I huff.

"I'm not leaving Ryuji behind!" she yells.

I look forwards and see another man who is being attacked by the same group of red players. I start making a dash to him but his is struck down by a man with a long sword. Then a girl and another guy gang up on him and start striking the ground. I can only see and hear damage effects as the poor guy is being murdered on the ground. I look back at the girl, her eyes wide, and her mouth open. I painfully look back at the guy and see crystals of light fly off from the ground. I reach into my pocket as the red players turn to me and take out a crystal.

"Teleport, Taft," I scoff.

I'm blinded briefly by light and quickly I find myself next to Aeri. Elina is hugging her tightly and I can see Daath and Owl talking close to a big barrier, past it I see floating islands, as if we were just on the edge of Aincrad. Elina lifts up her face and sees me with teary eyes. She stops hugging Aeri and jumps to me.

"Where's Reika and Ryuji?!" she asks desperately, "Are they ok?!"

"Who?" I reply.

A flash of light appears on my right side and I see the black haired girl pop out of it. She is kneeling, holding her hands up to her face.

"Reika!" Elina exclaims.

"Oh…" I mutter.

Reika looks up and sees Elina with teary eyes but then her eyebrows dip and she flares her teeth at her.

"You stupid kid!" Reika screams and lunges at Elina, ripping her off my side.

Elina shrieks as she is pushed to the ground, Reika quickly stands up and holds her up from her shoulder plates. She swings her with ease and throws her towards Daath. I run towards Elina and help her up. She looks pained and scared. At the barrier I look in between the bars and see nothing but an endless fall, we really are at the edge. I look to my left and to this Reika girl, she pushes me violently to the side. She gets close to Elina and again lifts her off her feet again. She leans her over the edge but Owl quickly intervenes. He pushes Reika away and places Elina behind him. I get up on my feet and walk to stand next to Owl. Reika drops to her knees and starts wailing loudly.

"He is dead! He is dead and it's all your fault!" she screams and points at Elina.

I look over my shoulder and see Elina crying as she clutches at my back. I place my hand on her back and hold her close. Reika punches the ground savagely and looks at me straight in the eye. She points at me and stands up as she gets closer.

"And you! You didn't do a thing!" she cries, "You let him die!"

I swallow my own spit as she blames me.

"That's…that's it, I'm done! I'm done with this! Fuck this world!" she screams.

I look past her for a brief moment and see a bunch of players standing behind her. They look sacred and some of them are judging us with their eyes. Then Reika dashes to us, Owl stands aside and I do the same still keeping Elina behind me. This time Reika doesn't go for Elina she steps up right over the barrier and then steps into nothing. I jump forwards just as she falls and manage to grab her hand as she is falling down.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?!" I say.

I find myself with half my body over the barrier dangling the poor girl as she keeps crying. Thankfully Owl grabs my waist and pulls me firmly. Feeling safe I reach down with my other hand and hold Reika's hand with both of mine.

"You can't just give up like this…" I say, struggling to keep my grip on the girls gloved hand, "You can't give up, come on!"

She looks up at me and I see the face of a girl that has given up on life. It tears through me, but I try my best to pull her up.

"Don't take this away from me…" she says softly as tears fall down her cheeks.

"You are not dying on me!" I say.

She looks down at the fall and sobs for a few seconds before bringing up her menu with her free hand. She goes over to equipment and selects the gloves. The options to inspect and to unequip pop up.

"No, no!" I yell.

She looks up at me one last time and presses the unequip command. I feel my hands lose all grip as the glove disappears into thin air. The girl falls out of my reach and the last I see of her is her relaxed expression as she plummets to the ground below.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of August/01/2016

Thanks to Donna Hufflepuff for beta-reading this chapter!

They say hope is the last to die, it just isn't the same for some people, and thus we dive into the angst/depressing/morbid pool. What do you guys think? I personally think I need to be super cautious when writing Elina. She is a special character whom you've guys now know quite a bit of so I hope to do her justice whenever I write her POV.

As always if you like what you read, please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: "ReSpec"


	18. Chapter 18 - ReSpec

**Chapter 18 - ReSpec**

**January/6th/2023 - Early Morning**

**Eleventh floor of Aincrad – Taft**

**Alshep**

Her face is burned into my head, her last words too. I lean back on the wall and shift my position a little. I didn't even bother to sleep on the bed today, so naturally sitting on the floor against the wall is the better idea. Elina didn't even come by on top of that. My only guess is that she wants to be left alone. So do I in a way, but her company would actually help in a moment like this. I close my eyes briefly but all I see is that girl's face as her words echo in my head.

"Don't take this away from me."

I feel a shiver go down my spine and I jerk my head a little. I open my eyes quickly and run over to the window. I open it using both of my hands and support myself with them at the very edge of the window. I see a few players walking by, one of them stares at me for a second or two but then keeps on walking. This floor is quiet and I like that, but right now all I want is something to keep my mind off of things.

I inhale deeply, taking the cold morning air into my lungs and then exhale very slowly. It's early, early enough for the sun to still be in hiding. I sit down on the edge of the window and stare around. Just like Daath said, Taft isn't the most exciting of floors, it has the most inns and vendors we've seen in a while, but other than that this whole floor might as well be a big market place and no one would beg to differ. I stand up and close the window, as I do so I hear my armor clanging slightly. Right, I didn't take this off. I put it away from my inventory menu and put on a simple navy blue coat and brown pants. I stretch out my arms leisurely in front of me. I need to take a walk.

I head to the door and open it slowly, it's at odd times like this that I'm suddenly mindful about other people. I close the door behind as gently as I opened it and head down the hallway towards the stairs. These inns have the same layout, all of them, or at least the ones we've stayed at do. It doesn't bug me, but it does mess a bit with my head. I can easily confuse what floor I'm on until I leave the inn.

I stumble slowly down the stairs, feeling devoid of energy and hungry for the first time in a long while. I slide my hand along the hand rail as I go down and turn as soon as I reach the end of it. I turn right into a peculiar scene. Aeri is sitting down at a table, alone with a mug of something between her hands. She stares out the window closest to her.

This is the first time I see her out of armor. She is wearing a simple blue blouse and black pants. It's nothing too fancy or eye-catching but, the fact that it's my first time seeing her out of armor makes the simple clothes look really special. She breathes in slowly, her chest moves accordingly as she exhales air and then she looks down at her mug. This is also the first time I can look at her without really feeling like I want to bother her in any way.

I walk over to her, for the first time in forever I feel the need to talk to her. As simple as that, even individuals like us should be able to get along, from time to time. I sit down, she hasn't noticed me, she is still lost in her own little world as she stares out the window, there's something almost sad about how she is staring out the inn. Curiously I peek into her mug, it's filled halfway with water, and also I notice an empty plate next to her. It seems she had an early breakfast. I shift a little in my seat and she still doesn't notice me.

The woman that runs the inn approaches me and asks me if I want something to eat. I stare at Aeri that still after the NPC's speech hasn't turned around. I nod to myself and order sausages and some eggs, along with a mug of water. The NPC smiles at me and turns around to head over to the inns kitchen. I turn around and see Aeri again, still looking into what little of the sky can be seen from the window on my right. It suddenly pains me a little to see her like this.

The girl that would laugh like a maniac as she killed monsters, or constantly tease me about anything she could now sits there in front of me not doing any of the things she usually does. The expression on her face is a weird combination of sadness, uselessness and I dare say even grief. It doesn't surprise me, but it angers me that something like what happened yesterday got to her so easily. It's a dumb, selfish, hypocritical thing to think. After all it got to me as well, but. Why her? Why Aeri?

I notice she tightens the grip around her mug, the NPC approaches me with a tray and sets it in front of me as she thanks me for my patronage. I begin to eat and see Aeri slowly turning her head towards me. She locks her eyes with mine and smiles only using her lips. Holding that smile her eyes tear up a little, about three tears come out of those pretty eyes of hers before she wipes any trace of them. I look down a bit and see her hand shaking a little. Unsure of what to do I reach out with my right hand and place it over hers.

"What happened to showing you have feelings around me?" I ask.

She chuckles in a hurt way, trying to force that laugh in between her pained voice and tears.

"Dumbass," she replies softly as she turns her hand around to hold mine.

* * *

She didn't say much after that, she quietly sat there as I ate my food. A few minutes later she let go off my hand and stared out the window again. It was calming and at the same time sad to see her like this. The way she looked at me, the tone of her voice, and the way she squeezed my hand tightly as she held it for those brief minutes. We sat together silently for a while after I finished eating, until she suggested we go out for a walk, which I had no other option but to comply.

"So, how's Eli?" she asks.

"I don't know to be honest…I want to know, but I'm not sure if it would be smart to bother her right now," I reply.

Aeri nods at what I say and we walk towards a small bridge that connects some of the town's districts. We stop while crossing it, she sits on the railing and turns around so her feet dangle over the small river below. I get next to her but don't sit on the railing, I just place my elbows on it and lean in next to her.

"I get why you say that," she mutters, "but I think this is one of the few times where she actually needs you to be there for her."

She is right, but I still think it would be wise for the both of us to be alone for a while longer. I sigh loudly and then breathe in deeply. The sun is starting to come up, painting the cold morning with a tone of orange.

"What about you? Someone needs to be there for you as well," I say, trying to change the subject.

She chuckles.

"I'm better at dealing with my issues alone," she states quietly, "yesterday just got to me…that's it. It's hard to see someone…just give up like that."

I stare down at the flowing water and suddenly back away as I remember that girl Reika. I hold my head and breathe out loudly.

"You ok?" Aeri asks.

I shake my head quickly and look down at the railing.

"I…I just can't get that girl out of my head," I huff.

I feel her pat my back gently.

"It just happened yesterday…give it some time."

I nod but I can't help but to get a bit mad at the same time. Her words are filled with compassion but at the same time she is telling me to discard a death I witnessed, just like that. In the end it is what I'll end up doing, it's not the death itself what bothers me, but why that girl did what she did.

"I think…I still can't believe it would be that easy for someone to give up," I mumble, "it…it scares me I guess."

"She wasn't strong enough."

I turn my head to Aeri, a bit confused to be honest. I raise my eyebrow as I feel the rising sun finally touch my face.

"What do you mean?" I ask.

She turns around and gets off from the railing.

"She lost someone dear to her, yes," she says "but she chose to give up instead of fighting."

I get where she is coming from but there is no way she is trying to say that girl was weak for giving up like that.

"If what drives you disappears, I think you need to find something new," she explains, "It's selfish to give up like that. Trust me I know."

As she says this she sounds more mad than empathetic. I feel like there's more to her words there, but I refrain from asking. She starts walking back the way we came from and I follow her. We walk in silence for a while, we walk past the inn and we find ourselves close to Taft's gate, close to it you can see the barrier from where Reika jumped off from just yesterday. I feel my stomach turn as I reluctantly follow Aeri towards it. We get to the barrier and Aeri leans against it with her elbows. I stay back for obvious reasons.

"You know, I thought about it, before meeting you guys," she says.

"Thought about what?" I ask.

"Doing what that girl did," she says.

I look at her for a few seconds, her expression doesn't change as she stares into the horizon. She means it.

"I later realized it was stupid, if I'm going out someway it'll be fighting," she says, "I will die trying to get out of here, not sacred and confused or without hope."

I can't help but to smile a bit.

"After finally getting that stupid idea out of my head I met you and Daath. I realized there were other things to live for in this world."

I get close to the barrier and place my hands on it. I rest my weight on it but try not to get too close to the barrier itself.

"I might not die fighting, but at least I'll live whatever time we stay in this forsaken game with friends…with this family we've created," she says with a warm tone.

I finally understand her train of thought but it's not like it's just as easy as she says. They say hope is the last to die but lately I've been thinking it's actually the first thing to go out.

"It's not that easy…" I mutter, "I won't take my own life, not even if shit really hits the fan…but I worry about Elina."

I straighten up immediately as I realize I probably should've kept quiet about that.

"She wouldn't be so rash about stuff," she says, discarding my comment quickly, "she'll be fine."

I guess she would be surprised. I breathe easy and hear how vendors on the street behind us have started to go about their days.

"How can you be so sure though?" I ask.

She looks at me with a smile.

"Cause she is strong, and we have a stronger person in our group. I like to think we share a collective strength," she says, "not that I'm trying to compare, but if someone has gone through bad stuff and come out on top it's him."

"Heh, yeah. Daath will keep us together," I say while laughing a bit.

Aeir looks at me and chuckles, she pats my back and turns around to lean her back on the barrier.

"I'm not talking about him," she says, "not that I disagree with what you say, but I wasn't exactly thinking about him."

"Who then?" I ask curiously.

"Owl."

"Him, really?" I ask in disbelief.

I get off from the barrier and look at down the street as it slowly crowds itself with NPCs and other players.

"You haven't talked to him that much, have you?" she asks.

"Nothing out of small talk no…" I mutter.

She sighs and gets off the barrier herself.

"I'll keep this short," she says, "let's just say Owl started this thing with both of his older siblings alive."

I feel a bit uncomfortable all of the sudden. I finally understand why she said that about him though. Out of the six of us I guess he's lost the most. Yet he is still here, he didn't give up. Nor does he show any sign of wanting to give up, if anything he is the one that fights more strongly for hope.

"He's given me no more excuses to give up, I'll tell you that," she adds. "About Elina…"

She stays silent for a few second but then looks at me, straight in the eye. The warmest expression I've seen her direct to me it almost makes me feel a bit embarrassed.

"On top of everything she's got you."

I nod slowly, acknowledging everything she said and why she said so. I put my hand on her head and rustle her hair slowly.

"Next time you are feeling down tell me," I say, "we found out just now we can have conversations like regular people."

She smiles widely and moves my hand off of her head.

"It's hard for me," she says, "I'll keep it in mind though."

"Heh, fair enough."

I start heading towards the inn, I want to check up on Elina.

"Thanks…" Aeri says.

I look over my shoulder and smirk at her.

"Don't start crying in front of me ever again," I tease.

She smiles and nods at me. I turn my sight to the lively street, some players are walking around, and some are buying stuff from the vendors. It's quite the change of scenery from just a few minutes ago. The town feels less gloomy, it catches more of a city vibe, with all the noise and scattered chatter all around.

I reach the inn shortly after and I open the door. The ground floor is filled with players, they are all eating and chatting away at different tables. Some sit in large groups, others in pairs. No one is alone. Scanning around for a second I quickly spot, Owl. I guess it helps he isn't hard to spot. He is sitting next to Kayla, in-front of him sits Daath. I walk over calmly and sit next to Daath.

"Morning," I huff.

Kayla smiles at me with her mouth closed since she is having a mouthful. Owl nods and yawns loudly.

"Morning," he says at the same time with Daath.

Kayla finishes chewing and swallows what she has in her mouth. She clears her throat and sets her fork down.

"Good morning, Al," she says.

I nod at her and smile a little, she resumes eating. I can't help but to feel that heaviness, lingering from yesterday on our table. It feels heavy and uncomfortable, but not as much as it did before I talked to Aeri. I look at Owl, he stares at me as if he knew what I was thinking, and I'm more than sure he does know.

He nods at me and do the same, I for one am a bit unsure of what this exchange means but I think I have an idea. I'm about to open my mouth when Aeri sits next to Daath and speaks.

"Let's start doing something, let's try to change things up," she says, "not only for us but for other people."

Kayla stares a bit dumbfounded, tilting her head like a puppy who is confused. Owl crosses his arms, closes his eyes and smiles as he nods.

"It seems you beat Al to it," he says.

The idea had been clinging in my mind since we saw that other girl die back on floor four, but even so I am unsure. I don't know what we can do, that is if we can do something. I'm sure Daath will try to object, but I guess only time will tell.

"I'm sure there's something we can do," mumbles Kayla after finishing another mouthful.

Daath sighs loudly and stands up. We all look at him as he paces back a bit, getting just a little away from the table we are all sitting at. He crosses his arms and turns around to look at us.

"What can you guys even begin to suggest?" he asks.

We all look at each other, lacking ideas, feeling a bit dumb for speaking out moments ago. Owl opens his eyes and stands up to look at Daath straight in the eye.

"We can train people…maybe?" he says a bit nervously, but his face suddenly catches a reassuring fire, "I bet there are people who haven't even left Starting City."

"Yeah, we can help those people, we can go back to them!" Kayla says excited.

I smile widely and stand up as well, looking at Daath.

"We can show them there's a chance, we can give them a chance!" I say raising my voice.

I can't help but to sound fired up as I say this. Aeri stands up next and grins widely.

"They must be scared and most must feel alone," she says, "maybe…just maybe we can show them not everything is lost. That we are making progress."

"We can give them hope," someone says.

We all look towards the stairs and see Elina on the very top of them. She comes down quickly and joins us, her eyes are red, looks like she's been crying a lot. I can't help but to smile at what she says and pull her close to me. She hugs me tightly and looks at me with a determined look.

Daath looks surprised, but he smiles. He nods. I look around and suddenly feel just a bit embarrassed everyone is starting to stare again. Some groups leave as if annoyed with our sudden outburst of loud comments. Some others stay back. In a few seconds only a group of five and us is left on the ground floor of the Inn.

"I guess not many others share the idea…" Kayla mumbles.

Daath nods yet again.

"Not like they have to listen to us jabber anyways," he replies.

From the side a girl suddenly approaches us. She walks slowly, looking a bit timid. She wears a blue skirt with a matching blouse. She almost looks like an NPC but a green cursor hovers over her head. Her eyes are blue and she has her hair up into two twin tails that fall to her sides barely reaching her shoulders.

"I do!" she says raising her voice.

Shortly after a boy, probably around the same age as Owl stands next to her. Armor clad he sets his hand over the pommel of his sword. He looks calm but that's not the kind of armor you get for being calm.

"I sort of think the same," he says scratching his nose.

Daath's jaw might as well be touching the floor, but he doesn't show any signs of being surprised or anything of the sort. He chuckles to himself.

"See, we can do something, I'm sure we can," Aeri says.

I look at her for a second, I'm sure she is struggling with this even more so because of how much she supported Daath and his rules about the group in the past.

The boy and girl stand next to us, looking at Daath, fiercely as if we were really discussing matters of life and death. Daath looks annoyed for a second but his expression changes from that to an understanding one quickly.

"So we go back, huh?" he asks.

I nod and step in front of everybody just a few feet away from Daath. I look straight at him, I'm smiling like an idiot I'm feeling too excited about something.

"You've come a long way, man," he says with a smirk.

I look back and see everyone from our original group plus the two new people who somehow managed to barge their way in. I focus on Elina a bit, she is smiling at me, pushing me forwards, reassuring me with just a look.

"No. We have," I say as I turn to look at Daath again.

"So, where do we start?" he asks.

I smile widely at him.

"We make a guild."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter has been updated as of August/05/2016

Big big things are coming for our characters in the future. I hope you are as excited as I am.

One of you mentioned Al has come a long way as a character in one of your reviews and I hope you see this chapter as more of a testament of that. EVERYONE has come along way and we still got ways to go. Tell me what you thought about this chapter if you have time, love hearing what you guys have to say.

As always, if you like what you read please leave a review!

Thank you for reading!

If you've been paying attention you might just figure out what the next chapter is gonna be about! ;)

Next Chapter: "Recalling"


	19. Chapter 19 - Recalling

**Chapter 19.- Recalling**

**November-6****th****-2022**

**Kozue**

"Hey dummy, snap out of it."

I straighten up a little as I hear my brother. The bus is driving slowly as it enters the more crowded districts. To my right, my older brother Yosuke is sitting adjacent to Andou, my eldest brother, who prefers to stand in the aisle. I'm the youngest of us three siblings, by three years. I remember my mother once saying she wanted a daughter at some point in her life, but she got three boys. She didn't say this in way that would make me think she regretted having three boys, she just said it from time to time, I believe she didn't mean anything by it.

"We are still far away," I say as I push Yosuke a bit.

He laughs and prods Andou with his elbow a little, catching his attention.

"Get a load of this guy," Yosuke says.

Andou laughs, keeping his volume down since the bus is quite crowded.

"We are closer than you think Kozu, you fell asleep almost as soon as we got on the bus," Andou states.

I feel a shiver go up my spine quickly.

"Please don't call me that while we are out on public," I say.

Both of them laugh together and Yosuke pokes my cheek.

"Oh come on Kozu, don't be like that," he teases.

"Come on, stop it," I plead, "It sounds girly."

Andou and Yosuke laugh together for a bit longer. I just sit there, staring away out the window, hoping to arrive to our destination faster.

"So what are you guys going to play as?" Yosuke asks.

"What do you mean, there aren't any classes or anything," Andou says, "from what I've read at least."

Andou and I remained silent for a moment afterwards, since we hadn't really planned much beforehand. I had done my research on Sword Art Online but it didn't sound like classes were a thing. I guess the only thing that differentiates players is what weapon they decide to specialize on.

"I'm going to play it smart, short sword and shield, the only way to go!" Andou says as he puffs his chest out.

I blow air out through my nose as he says this, it would seem that every single game the three of us play together he always goes with the same thing. Something allegedly "smart" as he says. To me it's just a tad bit boring, too cliché if you ask me. Andou is the type of guy that when prompted with a lot of options he just opts for the simple ones. Whenever we play an MMORPG for example out of all the options available he chooses a human warrior. Even when you can be a magical wizard of doom from outer space, he will choose a human warrior.

"I'll go with something stealthy, a rogue like set up I think," Yosuke states, "that way I can sneak around, be fast, deal great critical hits."

That's new for him, in the last two things we've played he went with overpowered tank-like builds. I think of both what my brothers say and ponder for a few more seconds.

"Ohoho, he is thinking!" Andou teases.

I chuckle slightly as I sneeze for some reason, it must be my morning allergies. I call them that but I have literally no idea what they are.

"I think I'll be the tank this time around," I mutter.

They nod at each other and then look at me, I nod at them, and the three of us smile to each other. We didn't always get along, but I'm glad we get along as much as we do now. It's been tough these past years, and if something, or someone should be there for tough times it's family. I happen just to be lucky enough to have these guys around. I look out the window again and notice we are near our stop. I get up and prod Yosuke jokingly with my leg to get him to move.

"Alright, let's get going then," Andou huffs as goes to the exit.

We step off the bus and I suddenly get a little cold. I zip up my jacket and look up at the sky. It's cloudy and a bit gloomy looking, but I guess there's no better weather if your plan is to stay locked up inside and play videogames. Andou slaps my back playfully and pushes me along with him as he starts walking. I shove him off quickly and laugh.

"You sure seem anxious," I say.

Both he and Yosuke suddenly stare at me with a blank expression.

"Dude, really?" Yosuke asks.

I nod, knowing exactly what both of them are going to snap at back at me.

"We've been waiting for this for ages!" Andou says.

"Yeah!" Yosuke says.

"Like for real man, more than a year in the waiting!" Andou continues.

"Yeah!" Yosuke echoes after his words again.

"Yosuke is so unbelievably gay sometimes!" Andou says with an equally excited tone.

"Yeah! Wait what?" Yosuke says confused.

I start laughing loudly and so much that I feel the need to hold my stomach. Andou laughs as well, he tries to stop laughing by closing his mouth but a few seconds later he bursts in even louder laughter. We keep walking for a bit, I keep laughing so much my stomach starts to hurt but I just can't stop it. Yosuke stares at us with an unimpressed expression on his face.

"Har har, hysterical," he huffs in monotone.

Soon enough we reach the game store, it has a bit of a long line coming out of it but nothing as bad as I expected. Just as we get there as of in some weird act of magic both Andou and I stop laughing. We get behind a girl with a hoodie, as I get closer I notice her hair. It's downright amazing, an absurdly bright tone of blond; it almost looks dyed but her hair is shiny which makes me think it's not. She doesn't smell all that good, though.

"Dude…is that a girl in front of you?" Yosuke asks Andou.

"Great eye, what tipped you off?" I tease.

"Yes, Yosuke as hard as it still is for you to believe, girls play games as well," Andou replies.

I laugh briefly and cough on purpose to avoid another laughing fit.

""She looks hot…" Yosuke mumbles, regrettably not in a low enough tone.

I reach forward to him and push his head, shortly after Andou flicks his forehead.

"Damn, keep your creepy comments to yourself," Andou coughs.

Yosuke has never been one to think before vocalizing, better for him to leave that to me or Andou. I dig my hand into my pocket looking for my ticket. I panic for a brief moment but quickly find it and pull it out of my pocket. Regrettably I search my other pocket and come to the conclusion that I don't have the money I was supposed to bring with me.

"Shi-" I cough, "Andou…"

"Yeah, you left it over the table don't worry," he says as he hands me money.

He smiles like a big brother would and I just return the expression as I take my money I thought to have left behind from his hand. The line moves ever so slowly, keeping a pace but slowly nonetheless. Yosuke shamelessly ogles the poor girl ahead of us and I just cross my arms as I sigh at my brother's shameful attitude. Andou and I exchange a few looks and silently agree that our brother is an obvious idiot. Soon enough only the girl ahead of of us separates us from our game.

"Man I'm so excited we should totally pull an all-nighter," Yosuke says.

"That does sound like a lot of fun…but I have to work tomorrow haha," Andou replies.

"You say that like you haven't done something like this before," I intrude.

"Heh, true," he answers with a grin.

"It's Sunday you dumbass, besides shouldn't you mind your own fucking business?" the girl ahead yells.

Catching my attention I tilt my head to look past my brothers. The girl with the hoodie violently snaps something from the clerks hand and quickly grabs her purchase bag. Surprised I exhale through my nose and cross my arms. Some people…

"Damn…" Andou mutters.

He looks at me for a second and I just shrug, some people don't know how to properly act out in public I guess. We move in the Line and Andou quickly hands his cash to the clerk getting himself a nervegear and a copy of the game. Next up is Yosuke, who opens his wallet and hands the clerk a debit card. This transaction takes a bit of time but this is just me feeling anxious. In hindsight we should've just paid our pre-orders full instead of waiting for today to pay. Finally Yosuke steps aside and I hand my ticket along with my money to the clerk. The man looks visibly upset, I don't blame him that girl gave him an earful anyways. I smile slightly to the man and he smiles back as he hands me my things.

"Thanks, have a nice day," I say.

The man smiles again and bows his head as I take my leave. I see both of my brothers, smiling, excited to go back home. I ponder in my head for a second if such state of…just happiness could've been achieved by us a few years ago. Time goes by, it doesn't stop and it leaves us to withstand its cruel gaze. I smile yet again, widely as I walk back out of the store.

"I can't wait any longer," Andou finally comments.

Yosuke laughs kindly to show that he understands, though if you didn't know him you'd probably mistakenly think he was being derisive. I chuckle quietly, still hiding in my own thoughts I walk slowly, following behind my brothers. Andou looks back a few times, once is enough for him to figure me out, the others he just turns around to see I'm not falling back behind.

We eventually make it to the bus stop, no one is there but us and we silently wait for the next bus. Andou and Yosuke both look at me and they already know why I'm not talkative, they know me all too well. I tend to dwell on my thoughts but if I've done so recently it's just to think about one thing in particular. The bus arrives and we promptly get on and take our seats. I sit next to the window, Yosuke sits next to me and finally Andou takes the aisle standing right next to Yousuke.

"Still hard for you to accept?" Andou asks softly. "Just how easy it is to move on, huh?"

I nod slowly, feeling a bit sad.

"It's not about it being easy…I almost feel…disrespectful you know?" I answer.

Andou and Yosuke blow air through their noses almost in full synch, Yosuke puts his hand on my shoulder and smiles brightly.

"It's what they would've wanted, Kozue," He says while reassuringly patting my shoulder.

Andou nods at my brother said and I feel myself relax a bit. Maybe they are right maybe that's what they would've wanted. For us to move on, to live happily, but is it ok to be this happy? I look out the window and suddenly feel a pain in my chest. Nothing to worry about, just that strong feeling you get when you miss someone that's no longer here. In this case in particular my parents. Our parents.

I let out a big sigh, deep from within my very being and press my forehead against the window. Slowly and without noticing the bus rocks me to sleep. What feels like mere seconds pass by and I'm awoken by Yosuke shaking my lightly. I jerk myself awake and yawn loudly as I turn my head.

"We are almost home lil bro."

"Yeah yeah…" I say audibly tired.

"So, names!" Andou says suddenly. "Going with Noda on this one."

I chuckle at how he just used four letters in his own name to come up with that. Yosuke leans forward looking excited.

"I have no idea myself , but…" he says and looks at me with a mocking expression, "I know what you are picking."

"Owlman something something," Andou interrupts.

"Right, right?" Yosuke laughs while turning to look at Andou.

The bus stops and Andou moves to get off, Yosuke follows and I tred behind laughing a little at how right they are, but they missed something. We step off the boss and start walking down the small street, the houses line up on both sides and the distant traffic can be mildly heard.

"Four thirty nine," I mutter.

"Hm?" they exclaim while turning around.

"Owlman four thrity nine," I say proudly.

They burst in laughter and I quickly join them as we turn right to open the little gate in front of our house. We step in, one after the other and I close the gate behind me as I'm the last to do so. Andou is already at the door swinging it open with all his might. Right after he does so Yosuke steps in and takes off his shoes, leabing them scattered in the entryway.

"Hey man! Shoes!" Andou yells but ultimately sighs as he picks them up and sets them on the rack along with his own.

I walk in behind him closing the door behind me. I take off my shoes and set them next to Andou's.

"Aunt, we are back!" I yell, "We are going to be playing some games if you need us!"

"Alright alright," I hear her reply from the kitchen.

I stop myself as I'm about to step on the hardwood floor. I turn to my right to a little counter just close to the door. A few months ago it would be riddled with some candles and pictures of my parents but now it lies almost empty. All but one picture gone. The one left is a picture of my brothers, my parents and me. We are smiling, it was one day we went to the beach. My dad is lifting me up in his arms, I must've been around six in this picture. My mother is hugging both of my brothers with a huge smile. I smile a little and put my fingers on the edge of the frame.

"Kozu! Hurry up!" Yosuke yells from the stairs.

"Coming!" I reply.

I open my bag and with one hand struggle a little to get the nervegear out of it. I hold the big box with one arm and grin at it as I start thinking about all the fun I'm going to have.

"Let's play."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

More backstory, I really enjoy writing these. They force me to think differently I need to focus more on the character whose past I'm unraveling it's quite fun.

I have a bit of an announcement, Donna Hufflepuff has left us for reasons I'll respect. So from here on out my chapters are going to be beta-read by mangachiaki. So a big thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "Business or Pleasure"


	20. Chapter 20 - Business or Pleasure

**Chapter 20.- Business or Pleasure**

**January-6****th****-2023**

**Eight floor of Aincrad – Frieven Village**

**Daath**

"So, a guild, huh?" asks Argo.

Finishing the rest of my ale, I sigh with satisfaction and push my mug forward to join the rest of my dirty plates in the center of the table before leaning back a little.

"Yup, I don't know what the hell got to him but at least he seems sure about, it," I comment.

Argo nods slowly and removes her hood. She brushes through her short hair with her fingers and breathes in deeply as if exhausted.

"How many people do you have in your group now?" she ponders.

"Six...uhh no…eight now."

"Eight people...geez, guild or not that's a lot of responsibility," she exclaims.

I silently agree with her by just nodding, she laughs halfheartedly and takes out a piece of what looks like melon bread out of her inventory.

"Where did you get that?" I ask very curiously.

She takes a bite out of the tasty looking pastry and takes her time chewing before swallowing it.

"There's this amazing cook in floor seventeen, a player," she says, "but I'll be damned she can make food look and taste like back in the real world."

"That's pretty impressive," I say with a big smile on my face.

"It is," she replies. "You should take your new guild there."

I laugh to myself a bit and pay the NPC for the food I had. While at it I order two mugs of ale.

"We aren't really a guild yet."

"Huh, how come?" she says surprised.

"Al has still to come up with a name," I say, "he has this issue that the name has to be completely perfect before he can think about anything else."

She gives me an understanding expression, along with a faint smile. The NPC returns with two mugs and sets them in front of us. She takes one and quickly takes a long sip from it. She ever so classily wipes her lips with her sleeve and sighs loudly as she finishes drinking.

"I can't say I blame him, I take hours on each character creation screen and about half of that time I spend only in the naming part," she says.

I nod and take a long sip of ale myself.

"It would seem we always end up meeting to talk about my crap huh?" I admit.

She nods with a smile and takes another long sip.

"I'll tell you this much," she mumbles, "it's way better than whatever else I would be doing at the moment."

"How so?"

"Daath, you keep me grounded," she explains, "If it weren't for these moments I'd have lost my mind a while ago."

The tone of her voice suddenly turns tired as she says this as if something really annoyed her.

"Info this, info that," she complains, "pk-ing here, pk-ing there...people giving up...it's all too depressing for me to handle...and..."

"And?" I question.

"People also rely on me, maybe not as much as your group relies on you but damn..." she pauses for a second, "It's hard to keep promises nowadays."

I understand all too well how Argo feels. I notice her hair subtly shift to cover her face as she hangs her head and exhales wearily. We all carry burden in here, or at least I assume so. It ain't easy, it ain't easy at all to be torn away from your life. To be forced to live in this world, to be forced to not only fear the monsters but as of lately the very people that serve this unjust sentence with us. In a lame ass attempt to reassure Argo I reach out towards her and pat her shoulder a few times before sitting back. She smiles slightly and drinks more from her mug.

"You just need friends, whiskers," I say, "and I hope you consider me one."

She wipes her mouth again with her sleeve and sets the mug down. She nods slowly and leans on the table.

"I guess you are a nice friend to have around," she says, "I just have to make sure not to fall on your bad side."

"Yeah that would be bad wouldn't it?" I joke.

She laughs loudly and I do as well. I wouldn't do anything to my trusty information broker.

"Speaking of," she says as she orders more ale, "I'm surprised you haven't asked for more info regarding players."

"It's not like you trade it anymore anyways," I answer quickly, "besides, I'm not PKK-ing again..."

"Really?" she asks in disbelief. "I thought for sure you were going to do something about those twins."

I clench my fist at how easily she just says that.

"Argo...I can't do much about it," I say a bit annoyed, "and even if I could I don't have much to go on regarding the people that killed that girl's brother."

She gets another mug of ale but doesn't drink right away.

"I guess you are right..." she says while nodding, "that case in particular is kind of sad."

I don't reply because I know where she is going with this but this doesn't stop her.

"Just giving up like that...damn," she mutters.

"We all have a breaking point," I say as I stand up.

She gives me a blank stare and then she looks at her mug.

"You gonna leave a lady to finish her drink alone?" she asks, playfully sounding offended.

"I'm sorry Argo, but I promised to go back to the others soon."

She nods slowly but I notice a hint of sadness in her expression.

"I'll make it up to you," I say.

"Aye aye, I'll see you around," she says while swinging her mug in the air.

As I turn she places her hood over her head and continues to drink in an empty table. I quickly equip a cloak and hide my face myself. I push the door of the tavern open and walk into the dark street.

"You spend an awful lot of time with that girl."

I turn around quickly and notice Aeri leaning against the wall just outside the tavern.

"You spend an awful amount of time stalking me," I joke.

Her face turns red but she quickly pulls her hood over her face. It makes me feel a bit bad that I joked like that since she does seems to have some kind of feelings towards me but she does a terrible job at hiding it.

"Sh...shut up," she answers.

"Yeah sorry, what are you doing here?"

"Al asked me to come get you, locator said you were in this floor," she explains, "got lucky into looking inside this tavern first."

I nod and cross my arms.

"He finally got a name or something?" I ask.

She shakes her head and with a smug expression she blows air through her nose.

"Nope, he is still stuck with that."

I chuckle and shake my head myself.

"Alright then let's head back," I huff.

Aeri leads the way in front of me, slowly walking towards the town's floor gate. She sways from side to side slowly as she walks. I notice her cloak swings with her body freely.

"Not wearing any armor?" I ask.

She turns around quickly and puts her hand around her back as if hiding her own butt. Her face red and a bit of an angry expression.

"H...how did you even notice?" she asked flustered.

"Uh...lucky guess?" I say trying to excuse myself from the fact that I might have been staring at her ass.

"Hmph...perv," she fumes.

I laugh embarrassed and scratch the back of my head. She stops herself and tugs the collar of her cloak to look inside. She then looks at me and then back down her cloak.

"You promise you won't laugh?" she asks.

I nod quickly getting rather curious. She sighs deeply and brings up her menu she goes over some tabs quickly and she puts away her cloak. Shiny light envelops her body and then disappears. A long slick white sundress reveals itself as the cloak disappears. It fits her just right, accenting her body just in the right places. She brings her hands in front of her and plays with her fingers nervously.

"Wh...what do you think?" she asks embarrassed, "I saw it on sale so..I...it was cheap so that's why I bought it ok?"

"Is that so..." I mumble while staring at her.

It's odd to see her out of armor and even more surprising to see her in such girly clothes. It's not like it doesn't fit her, it fits her rather well. She is...very pretty.

"So...so you like it?" she insists.

"Yeah it's nice...you are nice...uh I mean uh you look nice I mean," I say while I stare away from her.

As I turn around I see Aeri equipping her cloak again with a satisfied smile. I smile myself but feel the urge to stop myself. I cough to break the odd silence and walk past her. I guess one can only stay away from feelings like this for so long.

"We should be heading back no?" I say.

Aeri quickly catches up next to me and clears her throat.

"So...Argo right?" she asks.

"Huh?"

"That's that girl's name right?"

"Yeah, why you ask?" I question.

"No uh..uhm it's just that you seem to spend a lot of time with her," she says.

Feeling uncomfortable with the conversation I speed up my pace a little. Not enough to make it seem like I want to get away but just enough to make her catch up again. She pulls alongside me and is about to open her mouth when I interrupt her.

"She is just a friend, nothing else..."

Aeri closes her mouth and seems embarrassed, I would be too, but then again I take pride in the fact that I'm not an easy person to read.

"I still like you..." she utters.

The display of honesty surprises me so much that I stop on my tracks. Alright, we are doing this then.

"Did Al even send you?" I ask as I make my way to a less crowded area of the town.

Aeri follows me quietly, she makes damn sure to make little noise as possibly when walking too.

"No..." she admits.

I stop halfway through a long street, no one seems to be around, no players or NPCs in sight.

"Come one Aeri...we've talked about this."

"You are a liar though!" she exclaims. "I've seen how you look at me."

She quickly takes off her cloak, trying to make a point. I stare again for a brief second but turn my back on her.

"That's not the point, it's never been the point," I huff.

I feel her hug me from behind, I quickly but gently push her away. I turn to her, her eyes wide with surprise but not a hint of sadness or anything like that or like before. She just looks a bit unnerved.

"What are you so afraid of?" she asks.

"You want to know what I'm afraid of?" I miff.

Knowing more than well that I will sound like an edgy manga character that's too cool for school I breathe in deeply before speaking again.

"I'm afraid of caring too much alright? I'm afraid of liking you, caring too much for you..."

No more than my most honest thoughts and feelings in the matter go in that. You don't have to go look far away to see what I mean though. The relationship between Al and Eli is just enough to realize this. I've seen how sick with worry Al looks when Eli is danger, I've seen their exchange of affection and feelings in this world that is out to kill you. It seems cumbersome, it seems exhausting to fall in love when you don't even know if that person that you like will be able to be there with you tomorrow.

She smiles like an idiot and tries to get close to me, I back away accordingly and try to avoid her eyes. She paces slowly towards me again but this time I don't back away. She slowly places her hands on my fore arms and I freeze somewhat in place. She slowly traces my arms till both her hands are on my shoulders.

"Don't be," she mutters softly.

"Heh...it's not that ea-" I manage to say before she presses her lips against mine.

In the bliss of the moment I find myself embracing her, holding her close to me as if afraid she were to disappear in that very moment. I kiss her back accordingly and break off the nice feeling shortly after. I find her staring at me with wide beautiful eyes and I'm at a loss of words.

"We...we should get back, no?" she says softly.

"Uh...yes," I answer.

She starts heading the way we came and I slowly follow behind her. Unsure about what just happened and trying to process what the whole display of...affection might mean down the road. She hangs back a little and takes hold of my hand with hers. If something else had happened I think I would've quickly let go. Instead I squeeze back and let her pull me along the empty street. I can already see Al poking fun at Aeri and surprisingly I don't see her minding one bit.

We make it all the way to the gate just when I get a message from Al.

-From: Alshep  
-To: Daath  
-Subject: I got it.  
-Message: Hey make your way to Tolbana in the first floor. Also if you find Aeri drag her along I finally got it!

"Al wants to go down to Tolbana," I say.

"Tolbana? All the way to the first floor?" she asks.

I nod, feeling slightly confused myself. I walk over the gate and go all the way to floor number one. I turn my head to Aeri and nod at her again.

"Well, let's see what this guy came up with."

* * *

**First Floor of Aincrad – Tolbana**

"Wait!" Aeri says startled.

I stand just outside the inn pressing my hand against the door but not opening it. Flustered Aeri goes through her menu, quickly taking off the sun dress and replacing it with her usual armor. Regaining her normal posture and tone she puffs her chest out with pride.

"Why…?" I ask.

"I just uhm….Al…I mean he…he would make fun of me or something," she stammers.

"Hah, alright," I reply.

I move forwards and open the door to the inn we stayed at for the very first weeks of this nightmare. It almost feels nostalgic but at the same time it manages to be very unpleasant. The place is empty except for the few people I'm expecting. Compared to how full this place was back in the beginning it now feels barren.

"Hey," Owl says from a table on the other side of the room.

I wave at him and all of the other people in the table turn around to look at me and Aeri. Kayla, Elina and Al are there too. Along as well are the two new faces I haven't been able to properly meet yet. I see Al stand up from the table, clearly excited by the looks of it.

"Steel and Swords!" he says.

"What?" I say.

"The name man, the name!" he continues. "Our guild's name will be Steel and Swords."

"Well I'll be damned, I like it," I respond.

"You do?" he asks, surprised, "Even if I feel all cool and stuff and change the L for a number one and the O for a zero?"

I grin at him, smart play on the name, binary, I never expected someone like Al to come up with that.

"That is awesome. You didn't come up with that by yourself now did you?" I reply.

"Yes! Uh…well no…Owl helped."

I take a seat next to Owl who is sitting next to the new guy. I stare at the new addition without meaning it, I'm simply curious about him. He catches on and leans forwards a little to look at me.

"We weren't properly introduced, I'm Yu," he says calmly. "Don't want you staring at me like that now do I?"

Straight forward, I like this guy's approach.

"Daath," I reply while stretching my arm to shake his hand.

We shakes hand, his grip being quite firm, I take the time to look at his attire. He's got a heavy armor with this samurai-esque look to it. He hangs a falchion on his hip on his right side. Mean looking blade, considering how falchions spread out towards their tip. By no mean an average weapon but nothing as fancy as Aeri's war sword. I start pondering for a few seconds as to why Aeri hasn't changed swords, we all have after all. I mean, her sword is certainly good enough if we don't advance, but if we ever decide to go further up Aincrad she'll definitely need a new one..

Al takes a seat and Aeri just stands near the end of the table close to me. I find myself staring again but this time at the other new addition to our wonderful band of misfits. Another girl, a very cute one at that if I do say so myself. Big blue eyes and her black hair all tied up in a set of twin tails. Looking at how she reacts from me looking at her reminds me of Elina in the first few days after we met. She blushes a bit and looks down at her hands that are just lightly pressed on the table.

"I..uh hello..hi…" she mumbles.

"Daath, nice to meet you," I say and extend my hand towards her.

She lifts her right hand up and shaking a little meets mine, I barely feel her grip but she shakes my hand up and down awkwardly.

"E…Es…Esra…I'm Esra!" she says raising her voice with a funny spike.

I smile at her trying to get her to calm down but she just gets more flustered, to the point she starts covering her cheeks with her hands. Another notable characteristic of hers is that unlike everyone else seated at this table, she's wearing no armor and carries no weapon. She is just dressed up with a blue blouse and matching skirt. Light on the eyes and it sort of makes her look as if she weren't a player. Some people just like to go a little under the radar it seems.

"So what's the main idea now?" I ask to put us on topic. "You got more of an organized something now?"

"We've reached to the decision that we should be some kind of boot camp for low level players," Al says, "of course we aren't high level players, but for sure there are players who still do very little out of fear or stuff like that."

I nod at him, both in agreement and telling him to continue.

"We could help them get on their feet, realize this damn game…" he pauses and looks around the table with a smile, "this game isn't that bad."

I close my eyes and smile to myself. I cross my arm and chuckle slightly.

"Alright let's get started then," I say.

Al brings up his menu and brings up the guild management tab. He struggles around through the options but soon enough he is on the tab that prompts him to type in the guild's name. He starts typing in "Stee1 and Sw0rds", he is about to press confirm when Aeri stops him.

"Wait wait, drop the "and"," she says, "Use the other thingy…"

"Thingy?" Owl says.

"Yeah the thingy…" she says embarrassed, "looks like an eight thingy…stands for and…"

Kayla starts laughing loudly and soon Owl and Yu join her. Aeri appears visibly flustered being snapping out on everyone with an angry look.

"Shut up! It's a thingy!"

"Ampersand," Kayla huffs in between her laughter.

"Amper what?" Aeri replies.

"The thingy you are trying to describe is an ampersand," Kayla explains.

"Whatever…" Aeri miffs with her arms crossed.

Al chuckles slightly and erases what he was typing.

"Not the sharpest knife on the drawer," Al teases.

"Bite me," Aeri scoffs.

"Alrighty…" Al says as he finishes typing the name, but he doesn't press confirm, "this is the right thing…right?"

Everyone nods slowly trying to reassure him.

"It is," I say calmly.

He smiles, still looking a bit unsure but then he just smirks at me. I chuckle and nod again. He presses the confirm button and I lean a bit over the table. This is surely the start of something new. I look over at Aeri and see her smiling at me, I've seen her smile a lot of times but this time it feels different almost as if that smile in particular is only meant for me. It feels good, it really does. A sound of me getting a message pops me out of my little moment of bliss. It's the invite to the guild that all sent to me. It displays the "thingy" altered name.

"Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds"

* * *

Allow me to just take a moment of your time cause I just TITLE DROPPED! *cue fireworks and nonsensical dubstep*

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

This is me setting things up for a huge amount of events to come. A guild people with Al in charge instead of Daath I bet only a few of you saw that one coming. I'm excited and boy I wish I could bring myself to upload twice a week but I don't want to reach a point where I have nothing to post next yet. I'll be saving that for when our story is at it's end. Thank you all for reading and giving company through this wild ride that has now been 5 months of both your and my life. Hope that you stick around for much longer.

ICO: More on the new guys next week I promise! _; Also mangachiaki is appreciative of you welcoming her with open arms, thought I should let that be known that.

Nate: I just thought you should know I'm super glad you included the fact that you spotted Kayla in your review. (I thought for a second it might have been too vague.)

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds" (Haha get it? Cause that's the name of the guild? And guild stuff is going to be happening? I'm super fun at parties I swear.)


	21. Chapter 21 - Stee1 & Sw0rds

**Chapter 21.- Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds**

**January-7****th****-2023**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Starting City**

**Alshep**

I have to admit, I feel pretty psyched. Getting this sort of thing started is something that in the back of my head feels long overdue. This freaking world has just been filled with pain and violence. I guess in some way people could say I'm being hypocritical; after all, you don't get to be the level I am by just being a hippie scaredy-cat that fights for peace. But in the end, everyone needs to realize that we're all in the same boat and we should help each other instead of hindering the others' progress in this goddamned prison. Also, I guess it needs to be said that I feel like an idiot, walking around Starting City looking for strangers that might need help.

"Any low-levels looking for help?" Kayla firmly states as she walks beside me.

She glances a few times at me but keeps walking. She suddenly stops and looks at me, with her hand grabbing her chin. She tilts her head and sighs.

"I just can't get used to your new hairstyle," she says, pursing her lips.

I brush my fingers through my now combed back hair and chuckle softly.

"I just figure I need to look a bit more…authoritative now," I confess.

"I mean, of course it sort of suits you, but I had gotten used to those odd curls of you," she responds.

I laugh halfheartedly and look down the empty street; I sigh loudly and keep walking in this weird search for people. Lately, Starting City hasn't been particularly lively, not that it ever was. Particularly, right now it's mostly empty because everyone has already moved on to other floors. Yet some people are still hanging back, afraid and alone. It's not surprising though, hell, if it weren't cause of Daath I would probably be hanging back here as well.

Currently the idea is to walk around the city, trying to recruit new people. This is proving to be quite hard. Everyone seems dodgy. So far three players have approached me and Kayla. They were definitely curious but all three of them backed out once we started explaining what our guild was. They are all very wary about the whole deal…not like I blame them anyways.

"Damn…I'm getting bummed out by all of this…" I mutter.

Kayla turns towards me, albeit incredibly vaguely, but keeps her pace steady as she gazes at the city streets surrounding us.

"We will most definitely find someone, don't worry," she says reassuringly.

"Most definitely?"

"Probably…maybe…" she replies.

I acknowledge her and keep walking next to her. I see a few cursors ahead and clear my throat quickly. I bring my hands up to my mouth as I get ready to raise my voice.

"You guys need any help? We are a guild looking for members, trying to help people!" I yell.

I see the slightly far away players look sternly at us and then turn their backs on us as they walk away elsewhere.

"Oh bother…" Kayla utters.

"Yeah…" I mutter with a surprising lack of profanity.

"Well what were you guys expecting?" says a voice too close to my left.

I turn my body quickly and see a girl standing close to me. She has long, silky ash white hair that flows down her body just a bit past her shoulders. She is wearing regular clothes, a beige fluffy looking sweater and a fit pair of gray pants. No sword or anything on her either. I wonder how she managed to sneak up on me so easily. She crosses her arms and tilts her head to the side, her long white hair swaying slightly as she does this.

"Well?" she presses.

"None of yo…" I say but stop myself, "something better to be honest…we just want to help out…"

She stares at Kayla and I as if analyzing us thoroughly. I just now notice her eyes. Each one has a different color, kind of alluring. The right one is blue and her left one is brown. In a brief moment of paranoia I scan around, looking for orange cursors or anything that might look fishy. I come up with nothing and once I turn around I have the short girl standing awfully close to me, she seems to be standing on her tiptoes to get a better look at my face. She's only a little shorter than me, so she doesn't need to stand on her tip toes, but for some reason she feels the need to get all up in my face.

"You have to admit, you guys look a little weird," she says, "you know, going around the city screaming out for players to join your guild."

Kayla stands behind me being surprisingly quiet. I mean it's not like I expect her to join in the weird conversation like someone like Aeri might've already done but she is usually not that reserved.

"Well I guess it does look a bit weird," I admit.

The girl goes back on her feet and takes two steps back. She tilts her head again to side, trying to get a better look at Kayla.

"Is your friend mute?" she teases.

"I am not," Kayla replies with a hard tone.

The girl smiles and puts her hands behind her back.

"So what is your pitch anyways?" the girl asks.

This is amazingly uncomfortable, it's not like she poses a threat or anything but the whole direction she's given to the conversation just feels weird. At any rate I humor her.

"We are just looking for people who want to level up, you know, people that don't go out hunting or feel like they could get better at this," I explain, "…you are awfully weird…"

"People tell me that," she says, "anyways, can I join you guys?"

A bit surprised I take a step back and turn my head slightly to glance at Kayla. She is standing firmly with her arms crossed and a serious look on her face. She notices me turning and nods slightly. I turn again to the small looking girl.

"Sure…" I huff. "How old are you anyways?"

"Oh god, how bashful," she says in an exaggerated lady like tone.

"Christ Al, some manners please," Kayla seconds.

I shake my head and cough loudly to clear my throat.

"A name then, what's your name?" I ask.

"Ruri," she answers softly, "nice to meet you Al, and…?"

"Kayla," Kayla promptly responds.

"So glad you are not mute," Ruri says with a bright smile.

I can see Kayla get upset by her attitude which is surprising, I chuckle under my breath and pat her shoulder quickly before turning around.

"Alright let's make our way back to the center of the city, maybe the others had better luck," I say making my way to the main street.

There's something about this Ruri girl. I'm surprised by her name, mostly because it's the same as an old crush of mine. She isn't much taller than myself but something makes me think she might be older than me, but at the same time I'm not that sure at all. I find myself glancing back at her a couple of times and when she notices she gives me this big smile. I can't help but to notice how the two colors make her eyes really pop out. It's almost hypnotizing, like when you know you shouldn't stare but you still do.

"I'll admit, you two make a cute couple."

Kayla and I stop on our tracks and turn to look at Ruri.

"Haha, oh god no, you are mistaken," Kayla says.

"That is hurtful…" I mutter.

"I would agree, he is a very handsome guy," Ruri says. "You are also pretty good looking," she adds while turning to Kayla.

I look at her a little dumbfounded and she smiles, staring at me with cunning eyes.

"He is taken anyways," Kayla clarifies.

I stop caring about the conversation and turn myself to keep heading to the meeting point. I hear Kayla and Ruri start walking again behind me, I rub my neck a little and stretch my arm making it crack.

"That's a real bummer," Ruri says with a disappointed tone.

I glance back quickly but realize this is exactly what she wanted. Yet again I see her smile while she is looking at me with those alluring eyes of hers. Something is really throwing me off about her.

"What about you? Are you taken?" Ruri asks.

I chortle loudly but clear my throat to stop myself.

"I…what? No…I mean…what?" Kayla struggles.

"Not into girls?" Ruri questions adamantly.

Kayla remains in uncomfortable silence as we keep walking, suddenly and thankfully Daath comes into view. He lifts his hand in the air and beckons me over. I speed up my pace a little with the urgent need to get away from the peculiar situation.

"Hey, you found someone huh?" He asks.

I nod and finally clear my throat.

"Yeah, it's…uh…she…yeah," I huff.

"You need to be a little more descriptive mate," he says.

I see Owl arrive with another guy almost as huge as him, they seem to be chatting, but none of them seem to be particularly invested in the conversation.

"Oh yeah," Daath says, "We found someone as well."

"How's it going?" Owl asks as he arrives and stands next to me.

"Not much, who's this?" I reply.

"Kato," says the guy standing next to Owl.

If it weren't cause this guy is wearing game armor and has a sword I would definitely place this guy in a biker gang or something like that. He has this scary face and menacing posture, not the type of person I would expect to be playing games. Not like it surprises me that much but, he looks like the kind of guy you would expect to skip classes and beat up people at school. The scar on his right cheek doesn't help either, almost looks like his face was slashed. Then again, I'm just saying this from his looks. For some reason I'm now picturing how this guy would look rocking a pompadour hairstyle instead of his just plain brown hair.

"He is level three," Owl explains.

Kato blows air through his nose and crosses his arms as if he didn't want that information to be divulged.

"Now that you say that we didn't ask her, her level…" Kayla mutters as she arrives.

"Well just ask," Ruri replies softly but clearly with intent to tease.

"What level are you then?" Kayla asks promptly starting to get pissed.

Ruri close her eyes and smiles as she raises two fingers in her right hand.

"Two, huh?" Daath mumbles.

"Yesssir," Ruri sings.

"I wonder if Elina and Esra found someone as well," I huff and stretch a little.

"Hey!"

Speaking of the devil. I turn around, Elina and Esra are walking to us with a third tagging along next to them. Another guy, all dressed up in beginner gear, carrying a sword and shield. He stands a bit taller than Elina and he's got what has to be the most easygoing face I've seen since we started playing this game. It's a welcome change.

"Hey, hey, we found someone!" Elina says once they are within earshot.

"Awesome," I say.

They finally gather around with the rest of us and the new guy makes a point to being in the middle of everyone.

"Yoh! My name is Reginald!" he says enthusiastically, "very much obliged to be able to join other brave souls in this game!"

He puffs his chest out and stands proudly in the center of the circle like formation we made as we arrived. It was pretty hilarious for me. Here you have a guy with the most basic gear in the game standing around four other people who have better gear, boasting proudly about bravery.

"And of course," he huffs and brushes his hand past his messy black hair, "more than happy to be able to be around good looking ladies."

He says this as he turns to look at Esra and Elina and I just hold back the urge to burst out laughing. Esra practically turns around as she hides her blushing face and Elina just stands there oblivious to the guy's comment. I hear Owl snicker but see him hold his right hand close to his mouth to keep his laughter at bay.

"What's your level?" Daath asks.

"Level two!" Reginald states proudly as he holds his fist to his puffed out chest.

"Great, I dare say this was quite the fruitful task," Daath says with a smile.

"I guess we should head back, we left Yu and Aeri back at the inn," Owl comments.

"We could do with some training first, well for the new guys I mean." Daath suggests.

Owl, Daath, Elina and Kayla suddenly stare at me as if waiting for something. I raise my eyebrow and tilt my head slightly feeling very confused but then I realize.

"Right right, Guild leader." I mutter while pointing at myself.

"Pfft, off to a great start," Daath mumbles as he starts walking down the main road that leads to the City's exit.

I laugh nervously to myself but cough quickly to change my tone.

"Alright, so we are off to the plains just outside the city," I say, trying to sound as imposing as I can, "I assume you all have some basic gear right?"

Kato hits his chest plate loudly and rest his hand on the pommel of his starter long sword. It hangs on his left side with straps that wrap around his hip. Reginald just checks his sword and shield are in place if he had lost track of them.

"Oh, yeah, I think, hang on," Ruri mumbles.

Swiping her hand up she brings up her menu and quickly equips more battle ready gear. Her town clothes disappear quickly and are replaced with the starter leather light armor set. It consists of bracers, boots, and a piece of leather that is tightly strapped across her chest. Underneath this basic armor are just a plain blue colored shirt and brown pants.

"Great, you'll also need a weapon though," I add.

She nods quickly and reaches behind her hip with her left hand. She then takes out a silver dagger, nothing too fancy but it has a nice design to it. She holds it up in front of her face and quickly switches her grip on it, making the blade face the opposite direction of her previous hold of the thing. I bet she was one of those kids that played around with knifes when her parents told her not to.

Soon enough I'm straggling behind everyone, too many thoughts going through my mind. I am to lead these guys, to help them get better, to make them realize there's hope. How exactly do I do that? Am I even fit for such a task?

"In over your head?" Daath asks.

I see now that he stayed back with me, probably to talk with me about something relating to this very matter.

"Read my mind…" I huff.

"Hey, it's alright, we'll just help you," he says. "That's what we are here for."

He pats my back and I place my hand on his shoulder as we keep walking, drawing closer to the city's exit.

"Thanks man."

He nods with a grin and starts walking a bit faster to get ahead of the group. I match his pace and reach the city limit after going through the group of people. I stand right under the gates arch and turn myself around to face everyone.

"Alright I want everyone to have their weapons ready," I order.

The three new additions step in front from the rest and they all ready their weapons. Kato looks determined, with a hint of anger in his expression, but maybe that's just his face. He rests his blade on his shoulder as he holds the grip loosely with his right hand. Awkwardly Reginald holds both his shield and sword close to him as if he never had held them before. I guess it makes sense since he has spent the last months doing probably nothing. Ruri starts whistling a random tune as she balances her dagger on the tip of her index finger.

"Hey," I scoff.

Her eyes advert to me and she stares as she keeps balancing the weapon on the tip of her finger.

"Try to take this seriously alright?" I beg, "I don't want any of you getting hurt."

She nods understandingly and holds the dagger so the blade is pointing out over her thumb and index finger. I see Kato sigh profoundly and I just feel an urgent need to get this over with.

"Close to this city we can find some boars," Daath interjects, "these are easy enemies and all three of you can easily dispatch them, but you still need to be careful."

Nice assist.

"Let's just get this over with," Kato says rashly as he passes me and Daath, exiting the city.

Ruri follows behind him and brushes her hand over my shoulder as she goes through. Annoyed I turn around and start following them into the huge grasslands. Quickly enough the sound of steps and clanking armor become more apparent as everyone starts walking out of the city. I turn around just to check and everyone is following, everyone except Reginald.

He stands right at the edge of the city, his legs shaking and his gaze fixed on a point that just seems to be past us.

"Are you alright?" Elina asks.

He seems to be zoning out as he doesn't reply nor even acknowledges Elina's question. I walk back to him and stand just a few feet away from him.

"Hey man are yo-"

"Yeah! Yeah, I'm alright just…I'm alright!" he yells.

"Well, come on then…" I mutter.

"Yeah! Yeah…just give me a second," he says and stares at his feet.

I can see his legs shaking, he has a really panicked expression crawling all over his face. He slowly puts his right foot in front of the left and with one slow step crosses the city's gate. He then violently turns his head to me and smiles.

"Easy peasy! Just as I expected it to be!" he boasts. "Let's move along, brave soul!"

He easily walks past me and joins the small gathering of people in front of us. I can see Elina staring at me with a perplexed expression. I just shrug and shake my head as I join her with everybody.

"This is gonna be fun, huh?" I mumble sarcastically.

"Hey now, give them a chance," Elina replies.

* * *

It took a while to get Reginald to do anything useful, the first boar he went up against could've killed him if it weren't cause of Daath's tips and easy to pick up explanations. Reginald just went out flailing his sword at the enemy, he didn't even ready up a sword skill. It turns out he had no idea about them even existing. Daath and I thoroughly tried to explain how to get them to work. Even Elina offered herself as an example and properly demonstrated how you should attack the boar.

Ruri was another story, she had a vague idea of the combat system, so she at least knew about sword skills. She was able to take down the boars she went up against but her movements were slow and too easy to read. Kayla ended up trying to teach her a proper stance and how to move with her weapon. It ended up on a long discussion that started when Ruri purposely said she moved like a "majestic hippo". In the end Ruri managed to pick up some of Kayla's tips and actually had a proper stance once she started killing boars on her own again.

And now it was Kato's turn. Owl suggested he would help me give him an idea of the basics since Kato had a heavy armor and weapon just like him.

"So what you want to do is focus," Owl says softly, "Focus on your weapon, focus on the enemy."

Owl stands in-between Kato and a boar that just recently noticed us and is getting ready to attack. Kato is paying attention but at the same time just looks annoyed. I cross my arms and stare at him, trying to figure him out.

"Look for an opening and always try to be able to dodge, since I don't see you using a shield you might want for the boar to attack then step away and have an easy hit as he is getting ready again," Owl explains.

As he finishes his sentence the boar lunges towards him, Owl swiftly steps away from the boar's path and has a clear hit from the side.

"Just like this," he says calmly.

Right after that he readies a skill on his spear and stabs through the boar, killing it with one hit. He stands straight and presses the bottom of his spear on the ground, he looks back at Kato with a satisfied look on his face but he quickly erases it.

"This is dumb…" Kato mutters under his breath.

"You just have to get the hang o-"

"No, shut up, this is dumb as hell!" Kato interrupts. "Why even bother?"

I feel a little irritated and walk towards Owl, who's being motionless and unresponsive. He isn't one to dive into conflict head on anyways.

"Hey, we are just trying to help you out here, if you didn't want this why did you even tag along?" I say.

Kato clenches his open fist and throws his sword to the ground. It stabs the ground and sticks there by itself.

"It's just dumb, this game is dumb, everything here is stupid as hell," he says, "You guys are risking your damn lives trying to actually play this bullshit."

"And you've been very productive these last three months right?" I ask, enraged. "Listen up buddy, you are trapped here, with us and everyone else. We just choose not to be pathetic cowards who stay back in the first city."

Just now realizing my choice of words I expect Ruri or Reginald to look down on me but they don't even do that, they just stare at the unfolding scene.

Kato stares at me looking angry but without any words to reply to me. He kicks his sword and turns his back on me. Seconds later he turns around and points his finger at me as he starts to get closer.

"What do you know anyways?" he yells. "You probably have no life, nothing interesting to go back to!"

Looking past him I see pretty much everyone's faces catch a hint of sorrow. This makes me more pissed, pissed enough to not bother to think about the people back in the real world and more in setting this fucker straight.

"Why would I want to risk my life fighting these things and like…leveling up or whatever?!" he says. "It's just a bullshit game."

"Let me remind you it's no longer a game," I huff, "you live in this god damned place, just like us."

"Oh shut the fuck up chubs," he yells. "you are just another god damned nerd that thinks this freaking place is cool."

I start laughing loudly and go through my menu looking for this guy's name to send him an invite. I find it quickly enough and send him a duel invite to a half loss mode match. It quickly pops up in front of him and he takes a step back in surprise.

"This is what happens when I try to be nice," I cough, "bring it then, there's no way a nerd like me poses a threat right?"

He hesitates but accepts the invite. I grin at him as he picks up his sword and gets ready.

"I'll make it easier," I say and throw my sword away to the side, "there you go, Kato."

The countdown quickly reaches the last ten seconds and I stand a few feet away from Kato. I bring up my guard with just my arms and get ready for whatever this guy is about to do.

"I'm going to teach you a little something dumbass," I miff as the countdown reaches three seconds.

"Yeah, whatever I'm going to kick your ass," he replies.

The countdown reaches zero and he starts dashing towards me, I side step as he swings his sword at me. It gets stuck in the ground and, taking advantage of his momentary weakness, I kick him hard enough to send him back a few feet, his weapon still in the dirt.

"Oh you missed!" I boast as I open my arms at him, "Bring it, another go!"

He yells loudly for no reason and starts running towards me. He throws a punch that hits me in the stomach but I barely take a hit to my health points. I chuckle slightly and smirk at his dumb face.

"You see, your dumb size and attitude will do you nothing here," I mock.

I push his arm away and punch him in the stomach. He backs away from the impact and I turn my body around, delivering a roundhouse kick to his face. This hand to hand combat skill is real nice. I held back the strength a bit since I don't want to drop a lot of his HP.

"See that? This dumb game gives me an advantage," I yell, "Cause unlike you I haven't been a huge pussy and been hiding in the first city of the damn game!"

"Shut up! Shut up!" He rages as he stands up, "you are just a good for nothing!"

I chuckle and extend my right arm to him, I tease him to come over with my hand and he immediately dashes towards me again. This time he jumps at me and pushes me to the ground. He grabs my head in a lock and starts holding me tight. I manage to turn my body and kneel before elbowing him away from me.

"It's not fair," he says, "it's not fucking fair!"

"It could be though…" I mumble as I stand up and rub my neck, "I'm trying to give you a chance here."

"A chance? A chance at what?" he questions.

"A chance at fighting this damn game," I huff.

He stares at me looking surprised.

"Aren't you tired of just waiting in that city?" I ask. "Don't you want to move forward?

He punches the ground and stands up slowly. I can see a fire in him and I like it, he understands me but still wants to keep going. He smiles widely at me and cracks his fingers.

"I do want a chance," he says.

"Then bring it," I say with a grin.

This time he puts up his arms much like a boxer and how I was doing so but he seems all too professional about it. With small steps he closes the distance between me and him and soon enough we are circling each other looking for an opening. I could just take him down but I do want to give him a chance. I throw a slow punch and he quickly ducks, right after he punches me straight in the face. I actually take a few steps back from the hit and shake my head.

"Heh, nice," I comment.

He smirks at me and blows air through his nose. He steps in trying to throw a punch but instead kicks me on the side with his leg. Damn that's good. I quickly recover to the side and step in, this time focusing my punch. I throw it quickly and manage to slip it right in-between his arms hitting him in the face. This ends the duel as his HP goes below half. I bring my guard down and stand next to Kato who is kneeling on the ground.

"Hey man. Don't be a dick alright? That's my job around here," I joke.

"I guess I was wrong about you, I still think this whole thing to be dumb though," he answers.

"Give us a chance to change your mind then," I say and extend my open hand to him.

He grips it tightly standing up slowly, and then he shakes it firmly.

"Alright, I guess it can't be worse than staying in that damned city."

I look past Kato and see Daath doing a slow clap. Reginald is excited beyond belief, shadow boxing the air with excited eyes. Owl exchanges Col with Kayla and they both laugh. I scratch my head as I chuckle, did someone really bet against me?

"Let's head to the inn then," I yell, raising my fist into the air.

* * *

"See it's not so bad!" Aeri bellows, "I mean come on, when's the last time you sat in such a lively table?"

Aeri is practically leaning over Kato trying to change his frown. It's quite funny to watch, because she is trying so hard. We all sit at a big table, filled with food and drinks. Quite different from the usual there's a lot more people and a lot more food. Aeri, Elina, Owl, Kayla, Daath, Esra, Yu, Reginald, Ruri, and Kato. Definitely a lot of people. Eleven to be precise, if I count myself that is. It feels nice, it feels wholesome, and it just feels great. Everyone is laughing and smiling except for Kato who is really just playing hard to please at this point. All of the sudden I get the urge of doing something that might just look dumb. I stand up with my mug of ale in my hand and thrust it into the air in front of me.

"Guys!" I say raising my voice to catch everyone's attention.

Everyone turns to me and remains silent very quickly, quicker than I expected. I clear my throat and look around the table rather nervously.

"So…this is the first night we have as an official guild, well second but uh first with new members!" I stammer, quickly correcting myself.

Owl stands up with his mug as well, Kayla does the same and soon enough everyone is standing up except for Kato. He chuckles slightly and sighs quickly as he stands with his mug as well.

"I…just want to thank you guys I guess, for giving us a chance," I state, "it really means a lot."

I find myself lacking any further words but a sudden ray of brilliance crashes through.

"I promise to make you all stronger, to give you guys a chance in this world!" I say with a very excited tone.

Kato snickers a bit but then looks straight at me as he gives me a reassuring nod. Everyone else smiles and nods at me as well.

"So for…" I huff but stop as I did not think of a way to end this.

"For steel!" Owl yells.

"And swords!" Kayla finishes.

We all thrust our mugs in the air, hitting each other's in the progress, making ale splash around as we do so. We've all come a long way, and now it's not time to stop.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

More people! New faces! We are kicking another gear in so hold on to your butts.

Now off to my weekly rant. You know what I hate about writing this fic? I like staying true to the source material and I hope that so far you guys have seen this. I respect character progression, item and skill unlocks, etc. (I mean I even look up the revealed floors to see which ones I can actually mess with.) The only part where I went a little off script was in that fight Daath had with Kirito. BUT as I was saying what I hate about my love fore staying true to the source material is that I cannot really put the characters from the SAO anime and or novels in my fic. And you don't know how badly I want to have a bit of Silica in this fic. Of course I can find loop-holes and probably will (you will actually see a bit of Lisbeth soon) but the only characters I can sort of add in and even then just a little are Argo and Agil. AND LASTLY do you know why I can't have my sweet Silica around or even Lisbeth that much? CAUSE ALL OF THE CHARACTERS IN SAO REVOLVE AROUND KIRITO! They live and breathe for Kirito and this is slightly annoying to work with since I want Silica, Lisbeth and others to at least have an appearance or two. ANYWAYS!

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "Testing The Waters"


	22. Chapter 22 - Testing The Waters

**Chapter 22.- Testing The Waters**

**January/10****th****/2023**

**First Floor of Aincrad - Tolbana**

**Owl**

It had been a while since mornings were this fun, certainly adding more people to the group made things livelier. It's something I really appreciate, it's not like I've gotten bored or anything, but I have to admit getting to know other nice people is a thing that I very much welcome.

"Why do we have to wake up at this hour all the time now?" Aeri asks as she leans her body over the empty table.

I can see Eli trying to keep awake as her head bobs from side to side, her eyes barely staying open. She drowsily leans against Kayla and Kayla just shifts her body slightly to accommodate her. Like a mother or big sister would she runs her fingers through her hair practically sending Eli into a relaxing sleep. It's funny to see how different people act so early in the morning.

The new guys are just as fun and I always like getting to know people so that's a plus. Esra sits right across from me, looking tidy and energized. She happens to be the only one out of armor at the moment, but surprisingly I haven't seen her once with the same clothes. Next to me on my right side to be precise sits Kato, he looks sleep deprived almost as if he had just fallen asleep a few minutes ago before being woken up.

Reginald is another fun case, he is almost falling asleep like Eli but you can see he is definitely trying his hardest not to fall asleep. His eyes droopy, he supports his head with his right hand but he yanks his head up every time his arm begins to slip on the table. Ruri, on my left side laughs at this as she does nothing to stop it. Her hair is beyond messy and her attitude is still quite drowsy, she is the same as I've seen her these past few days but she is just deprived of energy right now.

I chuckle, very rightly so to myself to avoid getting any attention and lean over the table a bit. Resting my weight on my arms I yawn long and loudly.

"Woah, who woke up the lion?" Ruri mumbles. "Thought you were going to eat me there for a second."

I laugh a little and shake my head.

"Come on, my mouth isn't that big," I comment.

"You say that, yet tower over me," she says, "you are seriously huge."

"And not Al huge," Aeri adds.

Kato chortles suddenly and loudly and everyone starts laughing. Eli wakes up suddenly and sits straight, reminds me how I would react when I got caught sleeping in class. She rubs her eyes and then pats her cheeks slightly to pay more attention. We keep laughing when suddenly something catches my eye in the heads up display. A little emblem appeared right next to my HP bar. It reads "1 &amp; 0s" diagonally, a single simple looking sword on the background of the letters. Neat, they finally made a guild emblem. Just in time Daath, Yu and Al join us, standing on the far edge of the table.

"Nice emblem," I say.

"You noticed," Al replies, smiling faintly and giving me a thumbs-up.

He claps his hands together to get everyone's attention and he succeeds in doing so. He smiles as everyone looks at him and he places his hands on the edge of the table.

"Listen up, Regi, Ruri, and Kato, you guys are going to your first dungeon," he says firmly.

"Yay," Ruri replies, devoid of any kind of excitement.

Reginald stands up quickly, pumping his fist into the air.

"Alright, finally some action!" he says with fire in his voice.

"Just try not to cower away from it alright?" Kato mutters with his arms crossed.

Everyone chuckles at the harsh comment, but Reginald isn't discouraged at all. Instead of sitting back down, he now stands there, his arms crossed, looking straight at Al with a wide smirk.

"You got to work on that Regi, there's no bailing on your party today," Daath comments.

Reginald is a funny fellow, he is constantly boasting about the few skills he has learned and looks exceedingly proud about it. He has this obsession with courage and valor, yet he doesn't quite show it when he is taking on monsters. The first time he faced anything that wasn't a boar his knees practically buckled and we had to jump in and save him. He's been getting better though, that's for sure. He's got the basic sword skills down and his shield defense is quite impressive for someone who stayed the first three months of the game doing nothing.

"Owl and I will be going with you guys," Yu butts in, "we'll be there in case you need any help."

Al nods at Yu and turns to look at the new guys.

"I doubt it'll come to that," he says reassuringly, "you guys have a few levels now. So it's just about being careful now. You guys will do just fine."

I was not informed that I would be these guy's back up, but I'm not one to complain so I just stand up and walk to stand next to Yu. He pats my back quickly and nods towards the table.

"Sorry for the short notice…" he murmurs.

"It's ok, might be fun," I reply.

"Everyone else we got other work to do," Al adds, "so everyone eat something and on your merry way you go, we'll meet up back here later today."

* * *

"So how brave are you feeling boy?" Kato huffs while towering over Regi.

"Very, exceedingly, let's do this!" He replies, sword and shield at the ready but his knees shaking.

I find myself laughing to myself again, they haven't been many days together but they already get along very well. It's quite surprising considering how different they are. Ruri just stands next to Kato staring at the big door of the maze. She tilts her head to the side and suddenly scratches her butt. I burst out in laughter and turn away as I try my best to shut up.

"What's so funny?" Yu asks.

I shake my head as I finally stop laughing.

"No no…haha…nothing, nothing," I say.

I look past him and Ruri's staring at me, an angry, yet embarrassed expression over her face. She locks eyes with me for a few seconds but then just starts walking towards the door of the maze. I chuckle a bit still and ready my spear and shield.

"Alright, let's go," I say to Yu.

He nods and takes out his sword, he lets his arm down on his side and we leisurely walk through the maze's door with Kato and Regi walking behind us. Yu turns his body around as he keeps walking and points with his sword to Regi.

"Move up front, you guys have to be together."

They both nod quickly and catch up to Ruri seconds later. I remember stepping into this maze once or twice, simply because I was rather curious. I managed to reach floor five by myself but it was no easy feat, it was back before I met everyone else.

"So what's your stance on all of this?" Yu asks me. "You don't seem to talk much."

"What do you mean?"

"Well you know, taking people in and literally training them."

"I think it's good, everyone deserves a chance," I explain. "Besides we also took you in right?"

"I guess but…I just think it'd odd, I mean I'm all for your cause but…"

"But?" I insist.

"I don't know, I think I would go about it another way," he says.

With nothing else to say I just nod, acknowledging his comment. I guess in a way it is a bit odd. I mean going around town looking for people to join was awkward enough. We are doing the right thing though, Al has the right idea we just have to polish up the execution. Looking ahead I spot a single sentinel waiting further up the hallway. It's giving us his back, humanoid looking he just stands there with a simple sword and shield. It's a bit taller than myself and they can prove to be quite the enemy if not approached carefully.

"Ok guys, stop," I say.

Ruri, Kato and Regi stop and turn around as I say this.

"So this will be your first more challenging combat," I say, "Being in a party, especially now that we're officially a guild, gives you guys an advantage."

They come closer and listen attentively as I continue explaining.

"We covered the switch technique in training so it would be very wise to use it in this fight," I stop for a second and clear my throat quickly, "on top of that as I already said, you guys are in the same guild, according to Daath, this grants a few boons."

"Faster switch times and a slight boost in attack power," Yu says as he gets closer to the group.

I point with my spear past the new guys and point at the sentinel.

"So how do you start this combat?" I ask.

Ruri quickly takes out a throwing knife and turns around quickly. I smile a bit, I'm quite surprised. She takes a few steps forwards and Yu and I take a few back to give them space. Ruri stay in place and waits for Regi and Kato to be ready at her side. Throwing knives and picks serve two purposes, hunting and triggering. Small animals have little to no health and animals that are not classified as monsters also have small amounts of health, so picks and knives are a very easy way to take them out from a distance. For monsters and enemies they serve another purpose, this one being triggering. Triggering is something you do to get an enemy's attention, if you throw a knife at it, it will definitely take notice and therefore will start heading your way. This is a great strategy for instances when you want to isolate enemies in particular to pick them off with more ease.

Ruri nods at both Kato and Regi and throws the knife in a perfect arc, hitting the sentinel right in the back of its neck. The sentinel reacts and slowly turns its body around, locating the group of players he starts running towards them.

"Ready Regi!" Kato huffs.

Regi nods nervously and lifts up his kite shield, he holds it just around his chest and with his other hand he hesitantly raises his sword. The sentinel reaches Kato first and swings his sword at him. Kato reacts quickly and with his sword parries the sentinels attack, Kato's swing was strong enough to make the sentinel's sword blow back enough to leave a huge gap in his defense.

"Switch!" Kato yells.

Making a mad dash, Ruri steps in from the side and with her dagger unleashes a skill on the sentinel's chest. She slices three times at his chest and then ducks just in time to avoid its second attack. She spins her body while ducking and delivers a quick sweep-kick to the sentinel, making it lose its footing.

"Switch," Ruri says.

Regi takes a step forwards but suddenly freezes, his hands shake slightly and he looks rather panicked. I shift the grip on my spear and try to walk forwards but Yu stops me.

"Hang on, they can do it," he says.

Unsure I look back at Yu and then to the battle in front of me. Annoyed and with a groan Kato switches with Ruri instead of Regi. He clashes swords with the sentinel a few times and then manages to break its defense. Not wasting a second he readies a sword skill and delivers a punishing blow to the sentinel's chest, successfully destroying him in the process.

Ruri sighs loudly as she sheathes her dagger and leans against the wall with her arms crossed. Kato walks up to Regi and pushes him a bit.

"Dude what the hell? That was your cue."

Regi stumbles a bit as he steps back and suddenly snaps out of the weird trance he was in. He lets his arms fall down and both his shield and sword dangle on his sides.

"Sorry…I…shit, just sorry," He mumbles.

"Damn, get it right," Kato scolds.

He turns around and walks to towards Ruri, they start discussing something but they are too far away for me to hear. Reginald looks a bit down, he slowly brings his weapons up and sighs. Both Yu and I walk over to him.

"You really need to fix that," Yu mutters.

"Yeah yeah," he replies bitterly and moves towards Kato and Ruri.

"Maybe something more constructive next time?" I suggest.

Yu shrugs at me but then nods. Feeling a bit tired I set my shield on my back and start walking further down the hallway where Kato, Ruri and Regi are taking on set of two sentinels this time. Kato is going agro on one sentinel by himself to keep it from piling on Ruri and Regi. Ruri has proven to be quite fast and agile, she mostly dodges and very rarely blocks or goes for a parry. I never been one for high agility builds but I guess people have their reasons to favor them.

"Switch!" Ruri orders.

This time with a little less hesitation, Regi steps in but clumsily takes a hit head on before being able to attack himself. He quickly recovers and attacks the sentinel with a stab to the head. He pulls his sword out and then slashes one of its arms off with a perfectly timed sword skill.

"Great, now switch…" Yu mumbles besides me.

Thinking just the same thing I carefully watch Regi's next move. He is not switching out instead he steps back and with a roar steps back in and hits the sentinel into the ground with his shield.

"Switch!" he yells.

"Alright!" Yu cheers.

"That was better than I expected," I comment.

Ruri quickly jumps on top of the sentinel, practically sitting on the thing's shoulders as she places herself ready to attack. Her dagger glows purple and she proceeds to viciously stab the sentinels head until the monster disintegrates into bits of light. Feeling quite pumped I just smile widely at how much better that encounter went down.

"Switch…" Kato yells with a struggling tone.

Turning my attention to him I see him kick a sentinel away from him as he readies a sword skill. Regi being the closest one fails to react again but Ruri with a running start goes towards the stumbling sentinel. As she is reaching it she throws her body off the ground with amazing form and drop kicks the sentinel back towards Kato. Kato with a big smirk holds his glowing sword like a baseball bat and turns his body sideways just like a batter himself. With a battle cry and all his strength he swings his body and arms towards the approaching sentinel. He hits it right in the face with the edge of his blade and with no interruption it bursts into light, ending the fight. The result screens pops up in front of them and they cheer and rejoice through high fives and pats on the shoulder.

"Man, now I want to drop kick something," Yu says before laughing loudly.

I chuckle at his comment and pat his back to get him moving.

"Alright, great work, let's keep on going!" I say.

* * *

Going through the maze after that was easy enough. Ruri, Kato and Regi improved after each encounter. Regi hesitated less and was more proactive with every new enemy. Still freezing up at random but he definitely seems to be making an improvement. Regi's fear is very relatable, and despite how annoying it is, it'll probably be helpful in the future; I know from experience that you're more aware when you're afraid than when you're calm. Only problem is that poor Regi just seems to shut down. It's not something that can't be worked on but it might prove dangerous if it keeps up.

"Dammit!" Kato grunts as he is pushed back by a golem.

"Got your back," Ruri huffs as she runs past Kato.

Her dagger glows brightly and she stabs the golem on the chest, not being able to retrieve her weapon she leaves it there and dodges the golem's incoming attack. She jumps off the golem's arm and pulls her dagger off the thing. Skidding back a bit as she hits the ground she tosses a knife towards it. The golem with a roar slaps the knife away before it can reach him and starts moving towards Ruri.

"Switch!" Ruri commands as she turns to look at Regi.

Regi nods acknowledging her and with a few quick steps places himself in front of the golems path. His sword starts to glow green and he raises his shield in front of him. He hangs his sword back in a straight line and waits there patiently.

"What's he doing?" I ask while crossing my arms.

"Beats me, watching these guys has been odd," Yu replies.

The golem slams down his fist on top of Reginald but he quickly dodges to the side and unleashes his piercing skill on the golem's arm. This staggers the enemy and both Kato and Ruri jump in to deal some damage. A barrage of sparks and glowing blades can be seen from where I'm standing and I just sigh slowly as I move my shoulders in circles.

"Why wear that bulky armor then?" Yu asks.

"Hmm…" I exclaim and gently hit my shoulder pads with my shield, "I guess I just feel overall safer, besides, great defense stats."

"Light metal armor is just as good though!" He says as he hits his chest plate with a close fist.

"I guess it depends on who does the metalwork, you know any good smiths?" I question.

"I wouldn't say I know many, but I met this girl," He stops mid-sentence and ponders for a few seconds as if he didn't remember all that well, "Yeah, I met this girl, a player on floor fifteen. Weirdest thing though, she has pink hair."

"Hmm, I remember Daath telling me something about dyes and customization items…" I mutter. "Besides, Ruri's also has the weird hair tone going on."

I point to the white haired girl and Yu suddenly seems surprised.

"You hadn't noticed?" I ask.

He shakes his head and shrugs with a smile.

"Anyways, hell of a blacksmith, her swords and armor were quite the thing," he says.

"It would be nice to stop by then…" I mutter "Really looking for some upgrades and repairs."

"I'll tell you about the place when we get back."

"I'll hold you to that," I huff, "Daath will probably be interested too."

I notice a larger golem approaching Ruri and company but decide not to mind it that much, they've been doing alright anyways.

"So, how did you even meet Al and Aeri and all the other bunch?" Yu asks.

"Well…I was quite literally walking through the forest wh-"

"Hey guys! What does the purple cursor mean?"

"Oh shit!" Yu coughs as he unsheathes his sword.

I move my hand up my spear and get combat ready, it makes sense, when I look at the golem it doesn't show me a purple cursor cause I'm a not underleveled when comparing myself to it. Oh man we really dropped the ball on this. I look at Yu as we make our way to the golem.

"You get his attention, I'll attack from behind!" he says.

I nod quickly and stand my ground. I hit my spear against my shield and use my howl skill to attract the golem's attention. After I finish my long drawn out scream the golem is solely fixated on me. I move my right leg back and point my spear at the floor at an angle. Readying a hundred stabs the tip of the spear begins to shine. With my left hand I raise my shield, covering most of my body, getting ready to read this thing's next move.

Yu is already behind the golem and has started attacking with a barrage of sword skills. Stab, pierce, slashes, he was getting it with all he has.

"Alright tell me what to do…" says a nervous tone.

Glancing to my left I see Regi, his sword at the ready and his shield up. Then behind him I see Ruri with her dagger at hand, closely after Kato stands in my field of view, opening a potion with his mouth and drinking it promptly. The golem is a few feet away and I feel a wide grin on my face. This is how Al must feel when he is all psyched up in combat.

"Kato, you tank with me, watch out for any opportunity to parry, Ruri go with Yu help him attack from behind. Regi…" I say, "you will be my back up, get ready to switch when I say so."

He nods, confidently for the first time in all of the time that he has been training. The golem is already striking with its arm when I turn around, barely dodging I jump to the left with Kato and Regi. By the time we do this Ruri is already halfway across the golem, about to join Yu. Suddenly a remixed version of the dungeon's music kicks in. A deep bass drop followed by an acoustic guitar quickly changing into a strong electric guitar riff.

"Alright, let's do this!" Kato yells as he starts attacking the golem.

Finally executing my sword skill I unleash a flurry of stabs on the golem's legs. One stab after the other the damage effect glows on the golem's legs. Completing the stabs I step back and then push my spear in with my weight. Just as I do this, Kato attacks the other leg successfully staggering the enemy. Ruri jumps on the golem and while clinging to it begins to stab her dagger in and out of it.

"Switch!" I howl.

I step back and surprisingly Regi steps in without a moment's hesitation. He runs towards the enemy and slashes its legs before jumping towards the face. He twists his body a little and with his sword glowing drives it all the way to the hilt in its head.

"That's can't be good…" I mumble.

With his sword stuck he has no option but to hang in there and pull the sword out. The golem quickly recovers from the stagger and swats Regi off his face sending him flying towards the nearby wall. I can see his health bar drop a little bit below half and then falls a short distance to the ground. We are about to defeat the golem at this point, it's scary how even with Yu's and my own help this has proven a bit difficult. Still clinging to whatever she can Ruri still tries her best to both attack the golem and not fall from it. A whirring sounds tells me my spear is ready and I launch one final piercing attack, this time aiming more around the thing's chest. I connect with the enemy just as Kato attacks it as well. The golem bursts into bits and pieces of light and I drop my shield to catch Regi's falling blade with my left hand. Getting a hold of it just in time I turn to take a look at Regi, he is sitting down against the wall, resting his left arm on his bent knee. He looks disappointed and I don't like that. Ruri gets close to him and helps him on his feet.

"Hey, nice job," I comment sincerely.

"It doesn't matter, in the end I still screwed up…" he replies, sounding completely withdrawn.

"No, dude that was great, complete improvement," Yu backs me up.

Regi gets close to me and take the blade away from my hand, not forcefully but he doesn't even look at me when he does this.

"Still, not good enough…" he mutters and turns around.

He starts heading the way we came from and Kato silently follows him. Yeah, I guess we are about done with today. I bend over to pick up my shield and breathe out loudly.

"He shouldn't beat himself up like that," Ruri says.

Yu and I nod, she is right, he is being a little too hard on himself.

"Hey hey, how cool did I look?" she then asks.

Yu laughs a little, a laughter obviously coming from the relief in the sudden change of subject. He scratches his nose and breathes in deeply.

"Very," he replies.

I laugh a bit but can't help but to feel a bit bad for Regi, I see him go down to the floor below with Kato and I just sigh in place. I want to tell him something but I'm just with a lack of words.

* * *

"So yeah, it went well, but Regi worries me," I explain to Daath and Al.

Yu just nods at my words as he sits next to me on the table. Everyone had gone to sleep now, only the four of us stayed back to talk for a bit.

"Why though? I thought you said he's improved a lot," Al asks confused.

"Well he has…" Yu says for me, "but he beat himself up for not being good enough, even though he performed his best."

"Well I guess there's nothing wrong with wanting to be better," Daath says, "but it does sound a bit worrying."

"I say let him be for now, no use in assuming things," Al says. "Let's keep an eye on him though."

A long, loud yawn is suddenly heard coming from the stairs. All four of us turn to look at the source of the noise. Aeri is walking slowly with her eyes closed, still yawning and wearing nothing but a loose black shirt that goes all the way down almost to her knees.

"Daath….you coming to bed?" she asks drowsily and out loud.

"Haha. What?" Al huffs.

Daath chuckles and scratches his head. I turn again to Aeri and finally see her open her eyes. They become wide quickly and her face flushes hard. Without saying another word she goes back to the upstairs hallway and a door getting slammed is heard shortly after.

"I can't say I'm surprised," I comment.

"Yeah man at least I had the decency to more or less tell everyone about Elina and me," Al teases.

"Oh shut up, Mr. I watch her sleep from a chair," Daath replies.

"Hey hey, I, no that's a misunderstanding!" Al says

Yu bursts out in laughter and I do as well, Al gives up in explaining and rests his head on his hand. We laugh for about two straights minutes before we stop.

"Oh man…anyways, what were you guys doing today anyways?" I ask.

"We are getting a lot of Col," Al says, "I plan on getting us a neat guild house, but turns out they are expensive as hell."

"A house, huh?" I say.

"Yeah, a home, you know?" he says, "for all of us."

I didn't know you could purchase property in this game but the idea now sounds great. A place just for us, no more inns, it would be a place of our own.

"That sounds great," Yu comments.

"Damn right it does," Al replies.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

Soooo, that's this week! A little bit of everything in this chapter last week's reviews I might just run off script with more confidence in the future, who knows! ALSO! I hit 2,000! on this story last week! JUST WOW, you guys are awesome. I'm so glad to see that so much people have mis-clicked or actually enjoyed my writing haha. Now onwards to 3,000! Which is surprisingly close. Thank you all for still sticking around, now further we keep going!

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Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "To Be Strong"


	23. Chapter 23 - To Be Strong

**Chapter 23.- To Be Strong**

**January/ 11th/2023 – Early Morning**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Tolbana**

**Elina**

I've been trying to fall asleep for a while now, but I just can't, I feel too awake to be sleeping now. Even if I try my hardest I won't fall asleep. I turn around on my side and stretch my legs under the sheets. I see Al sleeping on his side, facing away from me. I get closer to him and press my cheek against his back, he's warm. I sit up slowly and rest my back against the bed's headboard. I bring up my menu and take out a sweet bun from my inventory. I suddenly remind myself of my sister, she always used to say that whenever you get bored you are either hungry or tired. I laugh a little at my thought and take a bite out of the sweet tasting bun.

I'm in the process of having my past midnight snack when I hear a noise from the hallway, a door closing followed by hurried footsteps that clearly make their way down the stairs of the inn. Curious, I slowly get out of bed and equip a cloak over my night clothes. Searching through the room's chest I grab my sword and buckler. I sheathe my sword on my hip and attach the buckler to my forearm. I hurriedly step over to the door, being sure to remain silent. I place my hand on the knob and turn it slowly. I slip through the crack in the doorway and look at Al, sleeping soundly on his side.

"I'll be back in a bit," I whisper.

Quietly I close the door as I exit into the dim lit hallways. I walk over to the stairs and as soon as I do I hear the door in the ground floor close. It seems I'm not that far behind. With my hand sliding over the handrail I go down to the ground floor and head for the inn's door. I swing it open and exit the building. My steps suddenly seem too noisy as I step into Tolbana's streets. I scan around curiously and see Reginald walking into the small forest next to the road you use to get to Tolbana. What's he doing?

I carefully follow him, silencing any noise my feet might have made until I can only hear the sound of his armor ahead of me. A gust of wind goes through the town as I exit it and start getting closer to the forest. The cold wind reminds me my clothing is probably a little on the light side, but it's too late to go back to the inn now. Once inside the forest, Reginald's steps seem to become louder, or maybe I just hear them clearer because I'm trying to concentrate.

I feel mischievous, following a friend so early in the morning. Focusing only on his back I take my steps slowly so he doesn't notice me. I take my right foot and set it slowly in-front of me but as I try to move my left foot I trip over and overgrown root. Tripping and falling on my face, I groan slightly. Still not wanting to get caught I roll to the left and stand up quickly to hide behind a tree. I breathe slowly, trying to reduce any kind of noise I could make. A few seconds pass and the sound of Reginald's armor moving becomes audible again. I peek out from the tree and see him walking straight to an opening in the forest.

Being a bit quicker and more careful I reach the last line of trees before the opening. It's a small area with no trees, like if the forest had a hole in the middle of it. In all the time I spent in Tolbana with Al and Daath I never found this area. Placing my body close to the tree's trunk I peek out just popping my head to the side. In the middle of the opening I can see three wolves. Two of them are lying down, while the other sits around scanning the area. Reginald stands in the opening facing the small pack of wolves. He unsheathes his sword and raises his shield. Confused I feel the need to go help him but I stand my ground, just staring behind the tree. Suddenly he starts running towards the wolves, my heart drops for a moment. Not for a second would I have done that when I was his level.

The sleeping wolves notice him and the one sitting down runs towards him with a scary face. The two that are lying down are quickly stand up to go at Reginald too. The first wolf jumps towards him and he just violently hits him with his shield, moving it out of the way and making it fall to the side. His swords starts glowing and he slashes at one of the wolves who is just standing up. After the slash he kicks it out of the way and with another skill attacks the other right beside him. Wolves are pretty tough, though; it only became easy to fight them when we got to level eight. He seems to be faring quite well on his own.

While Reginald was distracted by the other wolves, the one he had initially hit with his shield jumps at him. The animal topples him to the ground and starts biting him, I'm about to step out from behind the tree when Reginald with a scream of rage pushes the wolf off of him and stabs it across the thorax. The wolf dies and then he stands up, look at the other wolves that just know have begun circling him. Unsure of what to do I just keep peeking out to look at how he is doing.

"Come on!" I hear him yell.

As if ordered, one of the wolves runs towards him and bites his shield arm, arching his body a little he moves to be able to stab the wolf who is tightly clenching his arm in between its teeth. After a skill and two stabs he kills the wolf and only one remains. Catching his breath, Regi takes a few steps back and readies another skill, his sword glows golden, a color I really never seen before on a skill. The wolf closes in quickly to attack him and a sudden clinking noise effect sounds off from what I determine to be Reginald's direction. His body moves quickly to the side and holding his sword with both hands he drives the blade through the wolf's side as he is about to attack, completely going through it, and destroying it the process. Now I remember, that was counter skill. They only activate and connect when an enemy attacks.

The result screen pops up in front of him and he thoroughly reads it before dismissing it. He goes into his menu and takes out a medium health potion. I hadn't notice but his health dropped down to fifty percent during the fight. He opens the vial and drinks it slowly, once done he throws the vial to the side and it vanish before touching the ground. He sheathes his sword and stands there in place. I stop peeking out and lean a little against the tree. I slide down slowly to sit down and just turn my head around and peek to look at him. He is still standing there, breathing slowly, almost as if he were waiting. I stop peeking again and just rest my body against the tree.

About fifteen minutes pass, probably more, but I'm not paying too much attention. He's been standing there immobile. Suddenly a howl pierces the silence, peeking out I see the three same wolves standing in the forest's opening. He has been waiting for them to respawn all this time. I stare for a bit and he starts the encounter the same way he did last time. Running towards the same wolf at first, slapping it away with his shield as it comes close. Tired of twisting my body in this odd way I climb the tree and reach one of its big branches. I pull myself up and sit there. I can see the whole fight and at the same time remain out of sight.

The battle takes the same course as last time, but instead of having the first wolf toppling him over he turns swiftly to stab it as it practically jumps into his sword. Not wasting any more time he attacks the closest wolf before it and the other begin circling him, leaving him again only one enemy left. Regi's sword glows a different color now, red. Instead of waiting for it to attack he runs to it and slashes past him. He holds his form and then slowly straightens up. The wolf is frozen in place with a big long red line across him, then Reginald sheathes his sword and when he does the wolf disappears, prompting him with the result screen.

He sighs and walks back to the spot where he waited last time. This time he sits down, but faces my general direction.

"So are you going to come out soon?" he asks.

Taken by surprise I lose my balance and fall off the branch. I hit my back on the ground and slowly roll to be able to stand up.

"Ow…" I mumble. "How?"

"Being a coward back in that city paid off, my searching and listening skills are quite high," he says, "I noticed you since you came out the inn."

I get on my knees and then sit on my butt. I turn myself around and see that he is already close to me, extending his hand to help me get up. I reach out and he gently pulls me on my feet.

"Why are you out here by yourself?" I ask, "It…it's a bit dangerous."

"Yeah, I know it is…" he says, "but I have to, there's no other way. I have to get stronger, I have to stop being afraid."

"But, why not train with everyone…it'll be easier that way." I comment.

"I would just be a burden, I need to be able to stand for myself."

He says this as the clouds move away from the still present moon. I can see his face clearly, very clearly, he is pained by something, something that he is holding back. As he says his words his face just shows a deep honest feeling of sadness.

"You are not a burden…" I say softly.

He gives me a wry smile and walks past me, he reaches a nearby tree and sits down on the ground. He puts his hands on the back of his head and leisurely leans back on the tree, his gaze looking up at the still dark sky.

"How was the first month for you?" he asks.

I slowly make my way to him and sit on the ground too, I cross my legs though since I'm not going to lean on anything.

"Well it wasn't great, in fact it wasn't nice at all," I mutter.

"But you had your friends, no?" he says.

"Only Al and Daath at first," I add, "we went out hunting almost every day, getting better, little by little."

He stays silent, he brings his arms down and crosses them as he moves a little to get more comfortable.

"Wh…what about you?" I ask, regretting my question a little.

He sighs, and looks at me with that pained face.

"I…started playing this game with a couple of friends," he says, "four of them to be exact."

I want to say I'm sorry for asking, or that it's ok if he doesn't want to tell me, but I just can't say anything, no words will come out of my mouth. I swallow my own saliva and stare at him.

"I know three of them are dead, and it's all my fault…" he utters.

I look down at the ground unable to keep looking at him because of the subject at hand. Reika comes to mind and it makes me feel both extremely sad and uncomfortable. I look up at him for a second and see that he has noticed I stopped looking at him.

"We've all lost people, no?" he says.

I just nod slowly. I breathe in deeply and let all the air out with a loud and long sigh. I lift my head and realize he is looking up at the sky again.

"How…what happened? If you don't mind telling me…that is…" I say.

His expression is upset, of course it is…why wouldn't it be? He holds one of his hands to his throat and coughs softly. He opens his menu and takes a picture out of it. I get closer to him and he hands it over to me.

"These were my friends."

I hold the picture, I didn't have the slightest clue that you could take picture in this game. Examining it thoroughly I'm surprised by one single thing. Reginald looks exactly the same as he does right now, the only change is that he has blue hair in the picture. Next to him are his friends, one girl with golden eyes and red hair stands out the most, mainly because she is the only girl and because of the choice of hair color. She holds Reginald close with her arm, doing a peace sign with her other free hand. Next to them are other three guys, not that I mean not to pay attention but nothing really stands out of them. Maybe the wacky hair colors, but they just stand there smiling at the camera.

"Wait, when did you take this?" I ask, "and how?"

"The very first day, just a few minutes before the announcement," he explains.

He opens his inventory again and takes out a crystal I hadn't seen before.

"These are like cameras, you take a screenshot more like it. Then you can print it out on certain shops," he further explains.

"I see," I say nodding.

"Your avatar is almost identical to you," I comment.

"Never been much of a fan of character creation…" he replies.

"Who's this? She is pretty," I say while pointing at the girl.

"Her user name is Liru, her real name is Nanami, I knew her in real life. She lived next to me as a matter of fact," he says with a smile.

"Wait…is she...?" I ask.

"No, she is the only one who is still alive…" he says with a heavy tone of sorrow.

"Where is she?" I ask, hitting the poor guy with more questions.

"I don't know anymore, she took me out of her friends list last month," he says, "I used to check the monument of life from time to time, her name was still there last week…she won't die any time soon. She is strong and doesn't hesitate, unlike me…"

I feel awful for just having more questions as he keeps talking, I should be shutting up but my curiosity just grows stronger as he keeps being vague like that.

"You want to know what happened exactly, right?" he says.

I jerk my head up from the picture and look straight at him and then away to the opening, just in time to see the wolves re-spawn and the main one howl loudly.

"I…I'm sorry…" I mumble.

"It's alright, I guess it's only natural for you to be curious," he says and then pauses for a second, "Well as with pretty much everyone, it all started with that announcement."

I get closer to him and give him his picture back, he grabs it, looks at it for a second and smiles briefly before putting it away.

"We all stayed in Starting City for the first month, we were too shocked…too depressed to do anything. Days went by, in and out without us noticing, we didn't dare put a foot out of the city it was really…pathetic," he says. "We were scared, it was only natural no? One the one of the guys, Sato, also a friend of mine, I knew him in the real world too, got fed up, he was tired of staying there, he wanted to move on, he didn't want for us to give up."

I nod at him, paying close attention to his story.

"He suggested that we should go to the next town, that there were more people there, maybe we could train and stop being so afraid. He managed to convince everyone, including me. We had the…brilliant idea to head out of the City at night…"

He stands up and extend his hands towards me, he helps me up on my feet again starts walking to a thicker part of the forest. I follow him slowly.

"While on the road, we got ambushed by wolves, too many of them. We had no idea some enemies became more aggressive at night. We got surrounded, they were too many for us to handle. Everyone did all they could to stand their ground, but one by one they started killing us."

I bring my hands together and intertwine my fingers, feeling sad myself. Reginald stops and tries to clear his throat but the feeling inside him is too much to keep inside. With a hoarse voice that betrays his emotions, he resumes speaking.

"And…I just ran away, I ran away. I left my friends behind, I left them for dead as I did my best to reach Starting City again in the middle of the night. I reached the City's gate heaving and crying, I didn't know what to do. I stayed there at the gate leading out of the city for the remainder of the night, until…"

"Until?" I ponder.

"Until she came back, Nanami managed to come back. She was alone, but she was alive. I was happy, thrilled to see her, after a whole night of crying like a baby she was the most welcome sight ever. She was different though, her stare was cold and she didn't talk at all. She didn't talk to me at all. She stayed like that for three days, until she finally talked to me again. We were sitting in the street, leaning against one of the buildings, sulking, not doing anything at all. She finally spoke again that day. She asked me…why did you run?"

Feeling horrible I feel an awful emptiness in my stomach and a knot getting tighter in my throat.

"I couldn't think of anything to say to her, but she told me all the things that were clinging to the back of my head. You are a coward, you let us there to die, it was your fault, you killed them…it's your own fault everyone is dead."

"I'm…" I mumble.

"That wasn't the worst of it though," he says.

"That…can't be possible," I answer, my voice cracking in the process.

"After she was done getting all out of her system, she left the city without saying a thing, she was mad, sad, and disappointed. Deep down I still think she wanted me to go with her, but I just couldn't I was too afraid. I didn't want to die, I didn't want to risk my life."

A few tears start rolling down my cheeks, I don't want to cry full on but his words are going right through, reaching out to my own feelings. Feelings of being powerless and scared in this world. He looks at me and tears flow out of his eyes as well, but he keeps going.

"About three weeks after she left I could see on my menu that she was already a few floors up and had leveled quite a bit. It made me feel happy for some reason. I decided to send her a message after not hearing anything from her in such a long while. I remember I asked her how she was doing, that I was glad she kept on going strong. I sent that message with a smile, I actually got off my sorry ass and started exploring Starting City. The first day passed and I didn't hear anything from her. Then the second, after that a third day had passed by. Nothing at all from her. I checked the monument of life frequently…trying to make sure she was alive, and she was. She just didn't reply at all to my message."

He wipes his tears off his face and rubs his forehead with his palm.

"Instead of going back to sulking I started doing things around the city. I found Col on barrels, did minor fetch quest from NPC that asked me to get stuff from either side of the city. I was eating food from time to time I was leveling up my agility and searching skills, even the hearing one from eavesdropping on stranger's conversations. And then…I heard back from her, seven days after I sent her that message."

A bit hopeful I wipe my tears and get closer to him, I want to hear more.

"What did she say?" I ask.

"She asked me…how was I still alive? At first I thought she might've meant another thing, but seconds later she sent me another message…this one read, why are you still alive? It hit me across the face like a brick. All this time I actually held to the tiny hope of us still being friends, but she had long abandoned that."

I can feel a cry rise up my throat but I hold it in with all my might, instead a pained whine pierces silently through my lips. Tears don't stop flowing out of my eyes and I bring my hands up to cover my own mouth. He turns to me with an equally painful smile and keeps walking further down the forest.

"One good thing did happen," he says "I can't remember for how many days I didn't do a single thing after getting that message. I just sat there, the whole time, shocked, crying, feeling like both an idiot and a disgusting waste of space. In a way though I'm glad I stayed there, feeling sorry for myself."

"Why?" I ask, trying to hide my feelings from coming out in my words.

"Cause if I had been elsewhere…or not here at all…You and Esra would've never found me," he says smiling widely at me, tears still running down his eyes.

I start full out crying where I stand, my eyes getting blurry with my own tears. My voice breaking as I cry. I try getting close to him, he's suffered so much.

"I…I didn't know…" I cry.

Finally reaching him I wrap my arms around him and hold him tight. I didn't know why I was doing this nor if it was appropriate but his story just got to me, I felt his pain, I felt his sorrow, I felt his regret and more strongly so…I felt his guilt. When he's being going around acting tough and funny he is hurting inside, more deeply than anyone of us.

"It's alright," he says and pats my shoulder, "I'm not a useless idiot anymore."

I look up at him, still sobbing.

"I've found you guys, I'm definitely going to get stronger, I really will, I'll be clearing floors in no time," he says and laughs, "I'll be the bravest knight you guys will ever see."

His remark and tone make me smile. I back away from him and wipe my tears.

"I'm sure you will," I answer.

He laughs and scratches his nose.

"I still got a long way though," he says and looks up at the sky, he lifts his right hand up and grasps for thin air. "I'll be up there someday, helping people, clearing bosses, feeling…alive."

He slowly drags his arm down and looks at his now open palm.

"Someday…" he mutters, and then looks at me with determined eyes and a smile on his face.

"Until then," he huffs, "I'm counting on you!"

I nod at him and smile warmly at him. We all have our weight to pull, it's just different for each person. We all have regrets, we all have fears, but in the end it's a matter of overcoming them and pulling through. Most importantly though, we don't have to do it alone.

"Until then," I reply.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

I like to consider this one as one of my finest chapters, of course it's not perfect, it's probably not even good by any means but I just like it. It has a bit of everything and it just feels like stuff falls nicely into place. Once again Elina's POV is not one I write often but I thoroughly enjoy doing it. You guys know Elina she is small, cute and cares about everyone, this makes me write in a whole different way, even if it doesn't seem that apparent. While Al will curse and stomp his way around and Daath just stares and barely talks most of the time. Elina is a whole other thing, she is warm and welcoming and her dialogue is way more gentle than anything Daath and Al would say or think. Anyways! That's enough about that, I just liking writing Elina from time to time.

I'm so happy to see more people reviewing and helping me get so many views in just a short week. IT MAKES ME HAPPY AND THUS WANT TO WRITE MORE, so if anything I owe it to you guys.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Once again I would like you to take a bit of your time and visit my profile page if you haven't. I have posted a poll there in which I would like my readers input. You can find it at the top of my profile page.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

I hope you are ready for next week cause we are getting a guest star appearance!

Next Chapter: "**The Thief and The Blacksmith**"


	24. Chapter 24 -The Thief and The Blacksmith

**Chapter 24.- The Thief and The Blacksmith**

**January/16/2023**

**Twentieth Floor of Aincrad – Evergreen **

**Daath**

"I don't know about player blacksmiths…" I mutter, "Sounds, uhm, risky."

"Can't possibly be that bad," Kayla replies.

"Yu recommended her, I doubt it can be anything bad," Owl adds.

Yup, we're on floor twenty just because some guy recommended a blacksmith. This guy actually being Yu, and all we know about this blacksmith is that she's got pink hair, loves promoting her work and is quite loud. So I would say we are off to a great start. Thankfully this floor doesn't have much to it, it's composed of three towns; Evergreen, Lycanback, and Luffiand. Then you got the floor's maze which in my opinion is inappropriately named Sunshine Forest. It sounds way too lively and happy of a place for the actual death trap that it is.

"Should we be looking for a mat or an actual store?" Kayla asks.

"I very much doubt she's got a store set up, so maybe just a mat, hell, let's just look for a pink haired girl," I answer.

"Those customization items suddenly went into boom huh?" Owl comments, "Everyone is rocking odd colors up here."

Looking around you can confirm what Owl says is right, blue hair here, orange there, turquoise on this side. It was a bit odd at first but you would get used to it. It even fit some players way better than boring normal hair colors. In a way it makes things more colorful.

"My god this floor is crowded," Kayla huffs as she stands on her tiptoes to look over all the players and NPCs going on about the town's market district.

"I make weapons, repairs and enhancements!" An overly cheery voice pierces through.

We all listen to the same thing and start making our way to its origin which turns out to be just a few steps away from us on the closest buildings. Finally, after nudging the crowd of people buying stuff on the closest shop I come to a mat where a pink haired girl sits. She wears a hair clip on the right side of her hair and a maid-like red and white outfit, all complete with a bow and apron.

"Helloooo!" she eagerly greets me with her hands in the air, "Welcome to my lovely little piece of property!"

Owl and Kayla finally stand behind me and I stare down at the girl's mat, she has a small anvil in front of her and a hammer sits next to her lap.

"This is it?" Kayla whispers behind me.

"Yeah we are looking for…"

"The best blacksmith in all of Aincrad?" she interrupts me, "Well you found her! I am the one and only, the renowned Lisbeth; what are you looking for? Want a weapon crafted? Enhancements? Repairs? I got it all."

All three of us just stand in place, unsure, if we found what were looking for or not. Lisbeth overly joyous look turns to a mildly angered one.

"Hey, don't mock my craftsmanship without even trying me!" she complains, sounding really annoyed.

Owl steps forward presenting his spear.

"Fine I'll bite," He says.

Lisbeth extends her hands forward with a smile and receives the spear. She places it on top of her anvil, the spear merely balancing on the small thing. She hovers her finger over the weapon and its stats come up in the appraisal menu. She smiles a little and glides her fingers from the bottom of the spear to the small blade at the very top.

"Mifus Spear plus nine, sharpness four, quickness five," the blacksmith mutters, "Good weapon, so what do you want?"

"Just repairs, maybe an enhancement," Owl says.

"How about a better weapon?" Lisbeth proposes with a cunning smile.

"I don't even have materials," Owl explains.

"Oh but you do," Lisbeth says and proceeds to breaking the spears shaft, leaving only the tip out.

"Wha..why did you do that just now!" Owl miffs.

I have never heard him snap like that at anything, I guess there's a first time for everything.

"Follow me, big guy," Lisbeth says as she stands up with the tip of the spear in hand.

Kayla just stares and I follow Owl and the precocious blacksmith inside the building she's placed shop outside of. We go inside and see it's a more fully fledged blacksmith shop. An NPC stands behind a counter waiting, other than that there´s full access to a furnace, smelter and a proper, bigger anvil than the one she has outside. Without even asking Owl she throws the tip of the spear inside the smelter and takes out a set of pliers out of her pocket.

"Boy, you're going to love this," she says as she swings her own body back and forth in excitement.

A few more seconds pass and then she reaches inside the smelter with the pliers taking out a red hot orb like thing. With excitement she pushes it in a bucket of water, it steams wildly and then she takes it out.

"Alright, just what I wanted," she says as she grabs in her hands an odd shaped crystal-like thing, "An enhanced silver ingot!"

"What are you even doing?" Owl asks starting to sound a bit unnerved.

Lisbeth walks past him again and heads for the furnace, she grabs the silver ingot with her pliers and shoves it inside the furnace.

"Relax, this will be a thousand times better than you previous weapon," she says with a smile as she selects "production" on the furnace's menu.

"Hey but…but I'm not paying you for this!" Owl says raising his tone for the first time in all the time I've known him.

"Oh you won't, but he will," she says while pointing at me.

I lift my hand and point at myself, feeling strongly confused.

"Yes you," she says and puts both hands on her hips, "you are looking for something exceptional and I just happen to be able to provide it."

"Hmm," I huff and cross my arms as I look at her.

As a matter of fact I've been looking for a good player blacksmith to get overall better weapons and armors, but this chick is probably just one out of a hundred, I'm not gonna waste Col until I can see what she is capable of. She then points at me again, her finger centered on my person.

"And that sword you got is just magnificent!" she says, "Even though you can get it on the first floor almost no one picked it up!" she says growing more and more excited with each word.

"Alright then, impress me," I huff.

"What? Daath!? Dude!" Owl cries at me with worried look.

I can't do anything else but shrug uncomfortably at him. With a mischievous giggle, Lisbeth reaches inside the furnace and takes out the same odd shaped crystal but it glows with a strong tone of orange, obviously meaning it's been heated thoroughly. With that in between her pliers she runs outside the shop and back to her mat. Owl and I follow and see that Kayla is leaning against the wall were we left her, yawning and looking bored beyond her mind. Lisbeth jumps and falls on the ground, sitting right in front of her anvil.

"Now…" she mutters, and selects the spear type weapon from the little pop-up window in front of her anvil.

She places the hot piece of metal on top of the anvil and grabs the hammer that lies just next to her.

"You boys ready to see some magic?" she asks, a second after that she slams her hammer against the ingot.

Sparks fly out as she hits it, her smile becomes wider and she hits it again with all her might. Owl expression changes with every hit, I can't tell if he is excited or worried now.

"Alright!" Lisbeth exclaims after the third hit, "This one will turn out good, just have to make sure to get it in the next few hits,"

She hits it one more time, the clinking sound is loud and the girl just looks excited beyond measure to be crafting this.

"Fifth time's the charm," she says and laughs briefly.

She brings down her hammer on the piece of metal for a fifth and last time, when it starts to glow and takes the shape of a long weapon. Lisbeth moves back a little and places her hands on her lap, waiting anxiously. Owl now stands with his arms crossed as he looks the glowing, still unknown weapon. The glowing effect disappears in a second and a long, slick halberd is now seen.

The pole has a glossy crimson color and at both ends what seems like gold ring decorations. The blade itself parts in two ways from the top of the pole. One piece extends to form the halberd's curved blade and the other just like the tip of a spears stretches out a bit farther then the blade besides it.

"Ta-dah!" Lisbeth yells, "You know have a…"

She hovers her hand over the weapon and it's stats along with the name come up.

"Crimson Ballad!" she says while clapping her hands, "With better stats overall than your nine times upgraded spear from before!"

Owl reaches down and picks up the halberd. She moves it up and down testing its weight and then gives it a quick thrust forwards, going over Lisbeth's head in the process.

"I…well…I'm impressed," he admits.

After his words, Lisbeth gives a smug grin. I chuckle a bit and uncross my arms. I take out my sword and press the tip of the blade against the ground, leaning my weight on it a little.

"I knew it, you got the Anneal Blade, what are your stats?" she asks.

"Plus ten, four sharpness, four durability, two quickness," I boast.

Her eyes literally spark up with wonder as she reaches forward to grab my sword. Not reacting quick enough she snatches it away from my reach and places it on top of her anvil.

"This is amazing!" she exclaims, "I've seen five…maybe only seven other players that care about upgrading this much! Those guys clearing floors just go for strength builds, but this is beautifully balanced!"

This girl made me smile for some reason, she seems so passionate, so happy by just staring at sharp metal. She grabs the grip and raises the blade in a straight line in-front of her. She then opens her menu and with a few fast prompts materializes another blade into her left hand this time. An exact copy of my sword, she holds two anneal blades and moves her hands from side to side to examine both swords at once.

"How would you like to raise your stats to plus fifteen?" she asks me.

Before answering I can't help but to notice Kayla, who is leaning against the wall to the left of Lisbeth, yawning loudly. She's been just standing there this whole time, my only guess is that she isn't as excited about upgrades like myself and Owl. But her attitude right now feels odd, like she isn't her usual self. Not like I expect her to be all song and dance all of the time, I guess I'm not used to see her apathetic.

"Impress me," I answer.

With a smile, Lisbeth stands up and heads back inside the building with both blades. As soon as she goes in, she rushes for the smelter and throws the extra blade in there. Grabbing her pliers again she grabs a smelting cup and puts it below the smelter. She steps back a little and sighs before turning her head to me.

"So, what's up with you guys, never seen you before, and I see a lot of people, A LOT," she says.

"We usually stay quite some floors below, we are a small guild," I explain.

"Oh really, what's your guild's name?" she asks.

"Steel and Swords."

"Uhhh, neat," she says, "Kinda lame, don't you think? I guess it does have a nice ring to it though."

"I think it's cool, I wouldn't say spectacular though."

"Your friends aren't that talkative though, are they?"

"The girl usually is, I don't know what's up with her today," I mutter, "Gotta give it to you though, you are the first one to make that big guy raise his voice like that though."

Lisbeth laughs a little and scratches just below her nose. She's a rather pretty girl, she must be around Aeri's age, maybe a bit younger. And those cute freckles on her cheeks are just something I can appreciate. Standing next to the smelter I see little beads of sweat slowly trailing down her forehead. The nape of her neck is a bit shiny from sweat as well. She wipes her forehead with her sleeve and crouches to look inside the smelter. She has a nice figure too, and her outfit just fits her perfectly.

"My my, to think I thought Al was the pervert," Kayla whispers closely to my ear, "What would our poor Aeri say?"

Stiffening my posture at the sudden comment I turn my head slightly to look at Kayla's smug grin.

"Wh…what?"

"Oh come on, you are kind of obvious when you are so evidently ogling a girl out," she says.

"What are you talking about? I've only done so this one time," I say, trying to keep my voice down.

"Oh, so you do admit to it, huh?" she replies with an even bigger grin.

Realizing my mistake and press my palm against my face and take a few steps back. She laughs quietly and puts her right hand at her hip.

"I'll let this slide, after all you still have to be my servant for a day," she says.

Shit, I had forgotten about that. I shrug very visibly and sigh.

"Alright alright…can't believe you are giving me shit for just staring a bit…" I say, trying to excuse myself.

"Alrighty!" Lisbeth rejoices, "Here, grab this."

She hands me over the pliers, which are grabbing the smelting cup, it's glowing red and inside of it a liquid glowing with almost as much intensity. She then pushes my sword into the furnace and beckons me over with her hand. I walk over as instructed.

"Quick, we gotta do this before the materials harden up again," she says, "pour it on the fire."

Heeding the pink blacksmith's orders I pour the materials into the fire and see the fire turn to a silver color. She then, grabbing my swords grip places it over the odd colored flame and turns it over slowly. Making sure the flame touches every inch of the blade itself she then takes it out when the sword starts to glow faintly. She takes the blade to the nearby anvil and with her hammer hits on it quickly about ten times. After so, the glow disappears and she brings the sword back to the furnace, this time I notice the flame is different. Now burning orange, she does the same exact thing she did when the flam was silver. She then goes back to the anvil and hits it ten times again in quick succession.

"What exactly are you doing?" I ask curiously.

"I'm locking in the enhancements," she says, her voice sounding a little out of breath, "The color of the flame represents a different trait. Once I've enveloped the blade in the flame I need to…uh…hammer it in if you will, but I have to quick about this."

She repeats the process another three times, the flame changing back to silver and then orange the last two times. Taking the glowing blade once again out of the furnace she quickly makes her way out of the building. Kayla and I follow her outside and see her sitting in-front of her anvil again, she starts hitting the sword all over with her hammer. Once, twice, three times, and so on all the way to hitting it ten times again. With the last hit she moves back a bit and watches de sword glow brightly. The effect slowly dissipates and my sword sits over Lisbeth's anvil. She brings up the appraisal menu and turns to me with a wide smile.

"There you go!" she says, "Anneal Blade plus fifteen. With six sharpness, seven durability and two quickness!"

She is about to hand it over to me when a war hammer materializes on her hand. For some reason she starts swinging it my way and I just can't find the right window to react. A man in a black cloak comes running from my right side and harshly pushes me back as I am about to receive my sword. I fall back on my ass and see as Lisbeth strikes the man, the system blocks this and her hammer bounces back as she hits the purple field enveloping the player. The man pushes Lisbeth as well and snatches my sword away from his hands. Finally I understand why she took out her hammer I stand up and help Lisbeth on her feet.

"Don't help me, get that guy!" she yells as she starts running.

I turn around to Kayla and Owl.

"Kayla, help me. Owl please stand guard here."

Quickly acknowledging me, Kayla rushes past me and Owl sits down on Lisbeth's mat. Starting to run behind Kayla I can see Lisbeth giving chase to the man in black. With her hammer at the ready she sprints madly though the town. We turn a right on one of the last buildings visible before the forest and start running towards the thick of the trees. The marker of the safe area quickly disappears from my HUD and I get a bad feeling in my gut.

"Guys, we should be care-" I huff until a knife hits my chest.

Unable to move my body I fall on the ground with my own momentum, hitting my face in the process because I couldn't bring my hands up. My visibility is now reduced to the dirt on the ground right next to my face. I can move my eyes and my head but just slightly. Looking up I can see Kayla also lying down on the ground, not intentionally I lie there with quite an acceptable upskirt view. Trying not to stare too much I look past her and see the pink haired blacksmith fall on her back with a knife sticking out of her chest.

"That's cheating! Dammit!" I can her Lisbeth's voice crack a bit.

Looking around my HUD a little I spot a tiny yellow bolt next to my health bar. Paralyzed. These knives must've been coated with something to give them that effect. By the looks of it is a very strong paralyzer too. I'm completely unable to move anything below my neck I grunt and complain as I try to roll to face up on my back.

"That took me by surprise…" Kayla mutters, "I never been attacked by a player…This place is scary."

She slowly turns her body and rolls on her back, the clumsiness and way in which she does this makes her skirt climb a bit more.

"You better not be staring, Daath" she says with a sour tone.

"No not at all," I reply after looking up at her bright pink panties.

It's not like I wanted to, they were just in my general direction. With a grunt Kayla manages to sit up and very slowly pulls her skirt down.

"How are you even able to do that?" I ask.

"Just try to move a lot, look at it like button mashing," she says, "same principle I believe."

Taking her words into consideration I focus hard on trying to move. My arms and legs move just slightly, if I were able to fully move I would probably be flailing both my arms and legs at this moment. Finally I manage to place my hands below me and in an incredibly slow manner prop myself up to sit down.

"My god this is annoying," Kayla complains.

"Lisbeth, are you alright?" I ask as I'm finally able to turn my head.

"Yeah…" she mumbles with a depressed tone.

Kayla quickly stands up and stretches her limbs slowly, she mouths something as she does but I can't quite hear it, she looks annoyed though.

"Daath? Right?" Lisbeth asks.

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't react quickly enough, "she says.

"Well I don't know about you, but I'm getting my sword back," I mutter, finally standing up.

I turn to her and see her sitting on the floor, looking at her feet. Almost anyone can relate to someone having something stolen from them but this time in particular we both lost something. She lost her latest creation and I lost my sword, so I feel an instant connection to her expression.

"That guy has been stealing some of my works lately, this is the fourth," she confesses.

"How about we teach him a lesson?" I huff.

Lisbeth looks up at me with a confused expression.

"Kayla, go get Owl, and message Ruri, tell her to come up here," I order.

"Aye, chief," she says before running back into town.

I walk over to Lisbeth and extend my arm to her. She slowly takes a hold of it, and I gently pull her onto her feet.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

"I'm not going to stand around, that sword was better than ever. I'm not giving it up." I reply.

A few seconds later Kayla comes backs with Owl.

"Ruri is on her way, why do you want her by the way? She might be a bit underleveled up here," She comments.

"Her straining skill is the highest in the guild, it might help us locate this guy," I huff.

"Straining? Isn't that a bit farfetched?" Owl says.

"It sounds farfetched, right? But trust me, straining is probably more useful than tracking when you want to find someone," I say.

I start walking towards the way we went out of Evergreen and peek down the street towards the floor's gate. Just as I do a flash of light shines brightly and Ruri comes out eating an apple as she walks. She brings up her menu and I can see her access the tracking tab, seconds later she looks up and sees me, she waves and dismisses her me menu. She picks up the pace and gets to me just as everyone catches up behind me.

"Oh bummer, here I thought my dear Kayla had asked me out on a date," Ruri says teasingly as she approaches us.

"S-shut up!" Kayla says embarrassed, "we just need help, alright?."

"Relax, I am kidding," Ruri says, "or am I?"

Kayla flustered, walks away from Ruri and stands next to me. Ruri then stands up straight and places her hand up to salute me.

"What is up, second in command?"

"What?" I question.

"Nothing, bad joke, sir. What am I needed for, sir?" she says in a militaristic tone.

I chuckle slightly and cross my arms.

"Drop that, Ruri," I answer.

"Aye aye, sir!" she says bringing her hand down harshly and proceeding to stand like usual.

I look at Lisbeth and her expression is just confused beyond her reasoning. I place my hand on her shoulder, snapping her out of staring at Ruri with an eyebrow raised.

"What do you say we go get our stuff back?" I ask.

She looks straight at me and nods confidently.

"Count me in."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

This is a two parter folks! And I have cool matching chapter names to go along with them. Haha yeah I'm totally cool, right guys? ; _ ; DID YOU KNOW? SAO's crafting system is actually super in-depht and stuff but the anime never lets you see this? It's actually cool to find out about stuff through the novels and or manga.

**ICO: **Right on the money, Lisbeth it is.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "The Thief and The Hunters"


	25. Chapter 25 - The Thief and The Hunters

**Chapter 25.- The Thief and The Hunters**

**January/16/2023**

**Twentieth Floor of Aincrad – Evergreen's Forest**

**Ruri**

I've always liked forests. Something about their peaceful atmosphere has always appealed to me. Back in the real world I used to love going to Hakone and losing myself in the forests. Trying to climb tree just to see how far up I could go, scouting about just in hopes I could catch a quickly glimpse of whatever wildlife happened to be around. Hearing the cicadas do that lulling yet piercing sound in those hot summer days. I went there because my parents had a house in the region. They run a traditional inn with hot springs, tatami floors, and futons. You got all the whole rural, traditional deal.

"Hey, so you actually hear anything?" Kayla whispers by my side.

"Shush, honey," I reply, placing my index finger on her lips.

Immediately she blushes and slaps my hand away, I laugh a little and close my eyes to concentrate on hearing. Straining is definitely a useful skill, if you want to hear on someone else's conversation that is. What Daath is asking of me now is not only highly unusual but I very much doubt it'll be of any help. I empty my mind, I can hear Owl's armor shift and move as he moves slightly. I hear the blacksmith sigh and then a gut wrenching scream. A girl, or perhaps, a feminine man.

"There, did you guys hear that?" I ask.

"What? No…" replies the blacksmith.

I start walking and then begin a light run. I'm sure I heard a scream and the source is very clear to me.

"Quick, follow me," I say.

I start running faster, trying to get to the source of the scream. It's far away, but not enough to dispel my worries. I have to admit this could in no way be related to this thief I was told about but it's not something to leave without investigating. I start devising two silhouettes, they lie on the ground still, not moving at all.

I slow down my run and finally reach two girls, they lie on the ground, struggling to move but they just manage sluggish arm and leg movements. One notices me and her eyes widen in panic.

"Oh god, please don't hurt us please!" she pleads.

"Huh?" I exclaim, "I heard you scream, you two ok?"

I crouch down and give my hand to one of them, she doesn't reach out but only moves her arm slowly.

"What's wrong?" I ask.

Everyone arrives, almost out of breath. The girl with the pink hair comes close to me and gets on her knees next to the poor girls. This random girl is all too caring I guess, I mean I did come running to see if they needed help but I didn't exactly jump into their service.

"You two see a guy all dressed in black?" she asks desperately.

"He went running that way!" says one of the girls with her arm shaking she points to her left.

The blacksmith gets on her feet and starts running the way the girl pointed, Daath follows her quickly and I stay back with Owl and Kayla. Well, so much about thinking the blacksmith was a caring soul.

"They must have gotten paralyzed as well," Kayla mutters and gets on her knees.

She helps one of the girls sit up and leans her against a tree. Owl does the same with the other girl and I just stand there with nothing to do. I'm all for touching girls, but I take it this is not the time for that. I laugh at myself, not like I can say most of these things out loud.

"It'll be alright, just wait till the status effect disappears," Kayla mutters softly to them.

"Aww, you never whisper kindly like that next to my ear," I say and pout at her.

She sighs both loudly and visibly. My sweet, sweet princess, why are you so mean to me?

"Can't you be serious for just one second?" she retorts.

"Aww, but where's the fun in that?"

"Catch up to Lisbeth and Daath, they might need help," she orders me.

I nod without buggering her anymore and start another light run towards the direction Daath and this Lisbeth girl went into. I can still faintly see two persons running not far away from me, they seem to have stopped so I stop running and approach carefully. Finally getting a good view of the two people I notice they are Daath and Lisbeth. Not like there could be more people randomly running around in the forest, right? Her outfit is pretty cute, kind of frilly but not too silly. I get close to her and grab her skirt in my hands, feeling the fabric between my fingers. Admittedly, lifting it a little in the process.

"Wh-what are you doing?!" Lisbeth yelps as she turns around.

"Keep it down," Daath murmurs.

"Yeah, keep it down," I echo and keep playing around with her skirt.

I giggle slightly and get my right knee on the ground, placing myself in-between Daath and Lisbeth. They are staring forwards, to a series of huge trees. They are way bigger than the others around us, the trunks are wide and they go up almost as tall as some buildings I've seen in the city.

"Local flora is indeed very fascinating," I mutter.

Daath chuckles slightly and the blacksmith just grunts in annoyance.

"We lost track of him here," Daath explains, "he didn't go out of this area though, we checked around these trunks as soon as we got here so he most still be here."

I look around, scanning the surrounding terrain thoroughly. Nothing stands out only the wide trunks and branches that tower above us. I close my eyes and focus on straining again. I hear very little, Lisbeth's and Daath's slightly ragged breathing. With eyes closed one would assume they were doing a different activity all together but that is just my dirty mind's train of thought. I hear another sound, one that is most definitely out of place. A door slightly creaking and suddenly it closes. I hear the door lock followed by footsteps that slowly drown out. It's coming from above.

"Up there…" I say, feeling unsure myself.

"I guess that makes sense," Lisbeth mutters.

I open my menu and equip another dagger on myself. I reach back with both of my hands and take them out of their sheath on my hip. I bring them up and play with them a little, switching my grip on them and letting go of them to quickly catch them.

"Two weapons?" Lisbeth questions, "Is that even viable?"

"It isn't, swords skills are still only available for one weapon, they can't be used simultaneously nor are there skills for wielding two blades at once," Daath says, "I guess you could use one blade for parrying and the other for skills, but it would still be a hindrance."

What a reliable encyclopedia you are. I guess that's why he is sort of the leader after Al.

"Jeez nerds, I just want to climb this tree, you guys are thinking too much," I reply as I stand up and walk towards the closest wide tree.

I stab at the tree with both hands and I push my feet against it to get more of grip. I pull me left hand away and then stab a bit higher, I pull myself up a little and do the same with my other hand. Slowly I start making my way up the huge tree. Around halfway up the huge thing I reach some sort of landing, which is odd. It is way too flat and almost looks like it was purposely placed here. Then again who am I to judge game design? It takes me a bit to pull myself up, mainly because my feet are slipping but I manage to get myself up there.

Daath comes around behind me, slowly pacing to not fall of the small landing. I stare at him, confused as to how he's already up here.

"We found a ladder on the side of this thing," he says.

"So much for checking around the trunks, huh?"

He chuckles slightly and scratches his head. Finally looking around it can be seen that this higher area of the trees are connected with branches and small landings on each of the trees. Much like a series of tree houses connected by bridges, just without the houses.

"Now what though?" Asks Lisbeth as she finishes climbing up.

"I heard a door closing, there must be a door up here," I say.

I get up on my feet and balance myself quickly as I feel I'm losing balance. I have never been a fan of heights, I don't mind them too much but I still mind them. With my back pressed against the trunk I make my way around the trunk, feeling the tree around me with my hands, searching for something that feels or looks out of place. Lisbeth jumps from branch to branch to another landing and goes around it as well.

I admit I wouldn't be surprised if these trees served as access to some kind of sub dungeon, which would be a bit bad considering we are just three people. Then again though, if it were some kind of sub-dungeon that other guy came in here alone.

"I found a door!" Daath yells.

I jump to a branch in-front of me and see Daath on a farther tree, Lisbeth jumps to a branch as well and makes her way to Daath. I jump as well and slowly make my way there, being careful where I step as some of these branches are a bit slippery. I reach the landing and slip, just as I'm falling Lisbeth reaches for my hand and pulls me close to her. I cling to her with both my personal intent and just fear from falling.

"Uh…you can let go now," she says.

"But you smell nice," I reply.

She sighs and slowly moves me away from here. At least she isn't as forceful as Kayla.

"You are odd," she huffs.

"People tell me that," I say, "now…excuse me because this thing is locked."

Purposely I go past her, sticking my face close to her as I smile.

"How did you know?" Daath asks surprised.

"Heard it lock," I mutter as I go around him.

I reach the door and crouch, staring at the keyhole I examine the lock. I reach into my pocket and take out my lock pick. Let's just pray to whatever god is watching that I don't break this set since it is my last. I should've restocked.

"You are super shady," Daath mutters, "You got like a thief's skill set."

"Not a cool joke," Lisbeth says, crossing her arms.

"I spent a lot of time picking chests in Starting City," I say, "there's quite a few hidden all over there, that's why I already had fancy clothes when you guys found me."

I start picking the lock, it's quite harder than anything I've picked before but I believe I can handle this. Both hearing and feeling the locks as they set into place I move my hands slowly, trying to get it right. My training in all those crappy spy games will finally show its value.

"So do we even have a plan for when we find this person?" I ask,

"Well we take our stuff back, what else?" Lisbeth rages a bit.

"Well that is technically the gist of it?" Daath seconds.

"And then what? What stops this guy from coming back?" I ask.

"I'll just change floors, be more careful, it's not like I can kill him," she ponders, "…well I can, but I'm no killer."

Hearing a final click I turn the lock and successfully unlock the door.

"There," I say triumphantly and place my hand on the knob.

I turn the knob and as soon as I open the door I am tackled by the man in black, who rushes out of the door. We fall to the ground below together, sadly I cushion the fall for him and lose some health points as I crash against the ground. I push him off quickly and roll to the side taking my daggers in my hands.

He stands quickly and takes out a broad sword from his back. It's almost comical how easily he takes the sword out. He gets into a defensive stance and his blade begins to glow, I stand my ground and hold my daggers up, one slightly ahead of the other. He paces to side a little, like he is looking for an opening, but I'm not a lady to just spread wide open. He runs forwards and brings his sword down on me with an overhead swing. Barely dodging to the side I roll in and then out, getting back up on my feet quickly. I jump towards the guy who is still trying to pull his sword up, without a skill I'm about to drive both daggers into him when I remember the strike system of the game. In that moment's hesitation he kicks me in the stomach then with the blunt side of his sword hits me across the face. The impact brutally forces me to the ground and I drop my weapons in the process.

My health point take a drastic hit as well, even without a skill, his attacks managed to drop me way below half. My health itself is not blinking red just because of some miracle. I guess this is what it feels to be underleveled. I hear the sword whir and see a bright glow in the corner of my eye. Looking up I notice it's not the man's broadsword. Daath stands over me, shielding my body with his own. He wields a sword with serrated edges it uncannily resembles a sawfish. I'm suddenly quite hungry; I should go fishing soon.

"Come on now, you don't have to do this," he says, "even though by the looks of your cursor you already have."

Still on the ground I reach for my weapons and digging my hand into my pocket I take out a small red vial. I drink it and crawl from under Daath to stand next to him.

"I thought you lost your sword," I say.

"I have a few extras," he replies smugly.

I can see the thief clench his teeth together, actually I can almost hear him grinding them together. With a thud, Lisbeth falls on her feet behind me, she grunts at the impact but quickly raises her hammer to be ready. The thief throws knives at us again this time, Daath quickly deflects the three knives with a few swings of his sword. He laughs after effectively deflecting the knives, I dare say he didn't actually expect to be able to do that.

The thief uncovers his hooded face and then spits at the ground, Lisbeth quickly steps in-front of me and makes a confused sound.

"You are not him…you are not the same guy," she says.

"Perhaps you've met my associate," the man says with smirk, "worry not though, I do have all of your stuff."

What a convenient thing to say. Not only you say there are two of you but you also happen to have our stuff? I mean Jackpot, right?

Lisbeth's eyebrows dip, angered by the guy's statement she readies a skill on her hammer. Daath puts his hand in-front of her, stopping her from any further action. Looking back at the black-clad man I see a towering boy standing behind him. Owl along with Kayla finally caught up to us, with a weapon I've never seen before he places the thief into submission. Just by placing the tip of his halberd against his back he makes the thief bring his hands up, surrendering.

Daath puts his sword back into his inventory and Lisbeth hangs his weapon at her side.

"On the floor," Owl huffs, "kneel."

The man unwillingly bends his knees and with his hands up he looks around nervously, as if looking for an opening. With quick hurried steps Kayla comes close to the man, and kicks him with the sole of her boots into the ground.

"You stupid bastard," she seethes.

Taken away, by her words and actions, everyone, including myself, except Lisbeth stare at Kayla. With the man now covering his head on the ground Kayla kicks him again this time on his side. Daath quickly steps in and grabs hers arms, pulling her back with him.

"Hey hey, calm down," he says, "what's wrong with you?"

"This motherfu-"

She looks at how Owl, Daath and I stare at her and she quickly regains composure. She clears her throat and her body just looks more visibly relaxed. Slowly going back to the lovely woman I know.

"Apologies," she says, "I'll…I'll go cool off, I'll see you all back at the inn."

Rubbing her own cheeks she starts heading back to Evergreen.

"Sheesh, what was that about?" Owl mutters.

Daath shrugs and then Lisbeth crouches to speak to the thief.

"Give me back my stuff," she says.

"You guys are crazy," he mumbles.

Struggling a little he kneels back up and drops about five weapons on the floor through his menu. I see Daath's sword, along with two other longswords, a hammer, and a dagger with a wooden handle. Curious I pick it up and examine it thoroughly, it's light, but has a bit more weight than my own. It swings nicely and it's easy to handle.

"You like that?" Lisbeth asks.

"Well it's pretty," I mutter, "Can I buy it from you?"

"I'll tell you what I'll even enhance it for you, free of charge," she says as she finishes putting her stuff in her inventory.

"Oh, that's awesome, thank you," I reply.

She gives me a lovely smile and stands up, patting her skirt ridding it of dirt. She then stretches a little and sighs. She reaches for her hammer and with a skill crushes the ground right in front of the thief.

"Now get away from my sight!"

Stumbling backwards the thief runs away like a dog with its tail between its legs. I laugh a little, but interrupt myself with a long yawn, I really should sleep longer. We walk back to Evergreen at a rather slow pace, there is no longer anything to worry about after all. I have never been up this high in Aincrad, each floor has its own different thing, it's nice, would definitely love to see one with lots of snow.

Getting lost in my own thoughts isn't an odd thing, it happens most of the time, but it's not like I'm absent minded I just like thinking. This quiet, warm forest reminds me a lot of Hakone or even Koya-san, back in the real world I visited both places a lot. This place is just missing gigantic shrines and it'll be like being back in my grandma's house in Mount Koya.

"Ruri."

I stop walking and realize I'm already a midst a lot of people, turning my head I see Daath, Lisbeth and Owl. I walk over to them when another long yawn escapes my mouth. They gather next to the wall of a smith shop. Next to them a small matt with an anvil on top of it.

"Give me that dagger, I'll enhance it as a thank you," the cute girl says as she extends her hand towards me.

I place it on her hand and she goes inside the shop. Owl sighs loudly and with a few swipes on his menu stores his weapon and armor. I always thought the armor made him look bulky but it's his muscles that make him look bulky. A manly man this boy is and boy do I like what I see.

"Oh would have never in a million years believed you were this buff if I had not seen it," I huff as I hold my chin with my hand.

"It's just a little bit of gym really…and part time jobs I guess," he says.

"Could you take your shirt off?" I ask jokingly.

"Well, uh yeah sure," he replies.

Owl reaches down and starts pulling his shirt up. Sadly Daath stops him just before I can finish seeing that set of abs of him.

"Hey hey, she is screwing with you," Daath says.

"Is she?" Owl ponders.

"Am I?" I tease.

They both laugh a little and I naturally join them. As we laugh Lisbeth comes out of the shop with the dagger. It shines a bright orange-ish tone. She sets it on her anvil and with her hammer hits a couple of times until it stops shining. She wipes her brow and hands the dagger to me after checking some stats on a menu.

"There," she says.

I receive the neat looking dagger and trace my finger over the blade before sheathing is in the back of my hip. It will do nicely.

"So are you going to stay here?" Daath asks the Lisbeth.

"Geez, I don't know, I get a few clients the further up I am but I don't want to be around for that thief or his buddy to come back," she says, sounding worried.

"You could stay with us," Daath offers.

With a smile the pink haired blacksmith shakes her head.

"It's quite alright," she says, "although…"

She brings up her menu and sends us some invites. I quickly accept to being added to her friend list and consequently she is added to mine.

"Let's keep in touch alright? I can't thank you guys enough for helping me out today," she says whole heartedly.

"You got it, thanks for the sword," Daath says.

"And the halberd," adds Owl.

"And this baby," I say while taking out the dagger.

"All in a day's work," Lisbeth replies.

We are about to turn back and leave when Daath opens his menu to transfer some Col over to Lisbeth.

"Can't leave you empty handed though," he says.

"I won't say no to that," Lisbeth says and laughs.

Owl pats my back and we start heading towards the floor's gate. He moves lazily and so do I, maybe we both should catch on some sleep. And just maybe we can do so together. I smile to myself but then remind myself that I'm quite hungry. So hungry, wonder if I should sleep or eat something first, the answer doesn't really matter anyways. I'll get both done shortly.

Daath catches up with us and chuckles loudly.

"What a day, huh?" he says out loud.

"Yeah, for sure," Owl says.

"You guys ever been to Koya-san?" I ask.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

I enjoyed writing Lisbeth, she is fun, one of my favorites actually. Hopefully I'll find the way to write Asuna, Silica, and maybe even Kirito into my story in the future. Let us return to my rant of the other week, which wasn't really a rant. There is so much wasted potential in the anime, take this as a grain of salt though. I only mean the anime when it comes to this, the manga and novels go into so much more depth with everything and thus I really like the novels and the manga better. I mean, it is on the novels or manga (like SAO's Girls Ops for example) that you find about silly stuff like the fact that Silica has a cat named Pina in the real word and so on. But anyways you are here for a very short list of reasons. You enjoy SAO and/or enjoy my story. Obviously I would like the latter to be the stronger reason, but if you don't like SAO there is a strong chance you won't enjoy my story. ANYWAYS! SAO's universe is so rich and filled with potential it's just a shame the anime barely graced it's surface. Here's hoping they actually take their time with animating the Alicization Arc since it's my favorite. Enough of me blabbering.

Just now before uploading I hit 3K views! You guys are the best, thank you so much for bearing through my probably awful writing!

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "Thinking Back"


	26. Chapter 26 - Thinking Back

**Chapter 26.- Thinking Back**

**November/6****th****/2022**

**Kotaro**

My cats are prone to purring obnoxiously loudly; I suspect it's a ploy to force me to wake up and feed them. My dog is a little bit more discreet, he will come into my room and slowly lick my hand until I wake up. Whenever the cats start being loud first he just stays by the door because he already knows I'm going to stand up.

"Alright…alright…" I mumble as I sit up slowly.

Rubbing my eyes I yawn, as I'm still trying to wake up one of my cats gets on my bed and ever so slowly starts rubbing his body against my sides. I reach for my phone on my nightstand and unlock it to check the time.

"Geez, it's eleven o clock…?"I mutter, annoyed. "Let's have breakfast, I guess."

I slowly get off from my bed and sluggishly walk to the door. My dog sits just by the frame of it, wagging its tail like an idiot.

"You sent you minions to do your handiwork, huh?" I say jokingly.

The silly canine stares at me and wags his tail as he breathes in and out with his tongue out. Petting his head he wags his tail with more energy. I pat him and move his head towards the direction I'm going to move. Heading to the kitchen the urge to yawn again strikes me, still yawning I stop by my sister's room. I push the door in a little and with my free hand lean against the door's frame.

"Mako, you want something eat? Gonna make myself breakfast," I ask inside the room.

"I'll eat whatever you are eating," she replies.

Nodding to myself, I back away and head slowly towards the kitchen. I pick up four metallic plates from the floor, one being quite bigger than the others. With a measuring cup I put one cup of cat food in each of the small plates. I place the small plates on top of the counter and go get the dog's kibble. The vet said our poor dog Koro is quite fat, he is currently eating special kibble and I also have to measure how much I give him. Filling his bowl with the right quantity I set it on the floor and then place the other three bowls on the floor as well. The three cats come by quickly and like the dog start eating out of their respective bowls.

I open a cabinet and take out a frying pan to make some eggs, really in the mood for some toast and fried eggs. I place the pan over the stove and go to the fridge, before swinging it open I notice a sticky note, placed on the door of it. It's my mother's handwriting.

"I'll be home for lunch, please feed the cats and Koro, take care of your sister…love you, mom," I mutter to myself.

Nothing new on that front, I swing the door open and take out some butter along with four eggs. I placed them on the counter next to the stove and switch the stove on. I open one of the drawers on the side and take out some chopsticks. I grab just a bit of butter with them and spread that little bit as much as I can over the pan. The butter starts to melt as the pan itself heats up. Stopping for a second I can hear the cats and the dog going at their food, the kibble crunching as they bite into it.

"Christ, even when I feed you guys you are noisy as all hell."

I tilt the pan back and forth and side to side, then I grab and egg and crack it on the edge of the pan. With my thumbs I pry it open and the yolk and white fall from the shell into the pan. It slowly make a sizzling sound as it starts to fry. I grab a second egg and go about the same process but the yolk breaks and starts leaking as it falls on the pan. I sigh and grab the chop sticks again.

"I wanted an omelet anyways," I mumble.

With the chopsticks I mix the yolk and whites before they have any more time to fry. Tilting the pan, I slowly continue to move my hand in a circular motion to make that more familiar yellow-ish batter. I let it sit and turn around to take the bread out of the little pantry cabinet. I take out three slices as it's the only bread we have left. I grab two plates from the rack and place them close to the stove to easily move the food once I'm done. Before returning to the stove I jam two pieces of bread in the toaster and push the button down. I open another drawer and take a wooden spatula from it. My kitchen is a maze for the unexperienced.

Flipping the omelet over I get a plate ready since it'll be ready in a minute. I start whistling randomly as I place the soft omelet on the place. I set it to the side and crack the other two eggs over the pan. The toaster dings and I turn around with the pan. I start mixing again this time with the spatula and after leaning the spatula a bit on the edge of the pan I grab the two pieces of bread. I place one in the plate that already has an omelet and the other on the empty one. Before going back to placing the pan on the stove I put the other piece of bread in the toaster. Cooking is one of my knacks I guess, I'm not great at it, but I would definitely survive on my own. Soon enough I got myself two place with an omelet each. I split the last piece of toast in two and now each one of us has an omelet and one and a half pieces of toast. Before heading to my sister's room I open the fridge again and tale out some left over curry and the ketchup bottle. I douse my omelet on left over curry and then write my sister's name with ketchup on her omelet. Man, I would be a great housewife.

"This is such a manly thing to do," I tease myself.

"Get in here already, it smells good!" My sister yells.

I laugh soundly and with both plates in hand go over to her room. I push her door in with my back and there she is, sitting up on her bed, with about five pillows behind her to keep her that way.

"You are talking a whole bunch today, huh?" I tease.

"Shut up," she says with a giggle.

I sit on the edge of the bed close to her. I set my plate on her nightstand and keep hers as I place it slightly over my lap. Getting a better look at her I notice she is drenched in sweat, her forehead and neck a bit shiny from the sweat itself.

I'm about to place her plate as well on the stand when she stops me. Her hand weakly clutching my arm. She shakes a little but I just look up at her slightly pained expression. Dysautonomia is no fun, not for her and not for me…it pains me as well to see her like this.

"Can I eat before you wash me?" she begs.

I can't say no to that face. I grab the spoon and take a little bit of the omelet with some ketchup on it, I bring it up and Mako slowly opens her mouth. Carefully I put it in her mouth and she brings her lips down on the spoon as I pull it out of her mouth. She chews slowly and then quickly opens her mouth, breathing out quickly.

"Hot hot hot…" she complains.

"Ah, sorry about that," I mutter.

She continues to chew, and even manages to swallow, the uncomfortably hot omelet. I grab some more with the spoon but this time blow on it gently to at least make it a bit cooler for her.

"Ok, here it goes," I say, bringing the spoon close to her mouth again.

Slowly again she opens her mouth and closes it once the spoonful is inside. I get the spoon back to the plate and rest it for second on the side of the food.

"How's that settling in your stomach," I ask, "not going to throw it up are you?"

She shakes her head and finally swallows her mouthful.

"I'm liking it a lot, it's been a while since I had eggs," she says with a smile.

I return the smile and pat her head quickly, it must be awful, hell I'm not the one with the actual illness and already feel how awful it is. Being tired all the time, feeling dizzy, headaches, excessive sweating, and just a complete lack of body control. Some days she can't even get up, as a matter of fact it's been almost a month since I last saw her stand.

"Hey let me try on my own," she says.

She reaches for the plate on my lap and I help her get it close to her. She slowly places the plate on top of her lap with a little of my help. Slowly and with her hand shaking a little she grabs the spoon. I try my best not to pity her…after all she strictly asked me not to. It's a little hard at times, I just want to help her, but I don't want her to feel like I pity her. I don't after all, she is the strongest little girl I know.

At least today she has the strength to feed herself, and that's good. Also looks very proactive, the change in attitude is definitely a good sign. Most of the time she is too tired to even try and be happy or not sad about anything.

"This is harder than I remember," Mako jokes.

"Don't push yourself, I can always feed you," I say, "It's no problem."

She nods, but keeps feeding herself. While she eats I reach for my plate and start eating myself. The cold curry tastes quite alright with the warm omelet. Always been a fan of contrasting things like that, this case being the cold curry followed by the feeling of warm, soft egg.

"That game you've been playing finally comes out today, no?" Mako asks after a spoonful of food.

"Yeah," I say and chuckle, "I'm pretty excited."

"What's it about anyways?"

"Well…I mean it's a bit hard to explain. It's just this huge world that feels so real. There are monsters and other people you play with, all having a blast. You do quests, fight monsters, explore places, all in virtual reality it's like having no limit to what you can do."

For the first time in a week Mako, finishes what's on her plate and sets it aside with her spoon on top of it. I feel happy about this little thing, it might not mean a lot, but it sure feels like a big deal for me. She leans back a little and closes her eyes. Breathing in and out softly she remains still.

"I really hope this doesn't upset my stomach or something," she mutters.

"Don't think about it then," I advise.

I eat the last of my breakfast and put the empty plate on top of Mako's. I grab them both and walk out of her room.

"If you can, start undressing, I'll get the other stuff," I say to the air as I walk out.

I place both plates on the sink and slightly rinse them, I'll clean them later, got to go one thing at a time. The bathroom is close to my sister's room; I enter it and grab the designated bucket and sponge. I crouch and fill the bucket with lukewarm water. With my teeth I grab the sponge and hold the bucket with both hands. Slowly pacing to my sister's room I go carefully to avoid spilling any water.

"Ehhh…I hate how it gets sort of sticky…"I hear Mako complain as I walk in.

She takes off her pajama top and sits on top of her sheets with a black sports bra. I sit down on the edge of the bed again and set the bucket at my feet, plucking the sponge from my lips and putting it beside me on the bed.

"Any color in particular you want today?" I ask getting up from the bed.

"The blue one, no wait the green one," she says.

I open her drawer and take out a pair of panties and the green bra. My sis is the type of person who buys bras in bulk. Or so I say but she just has the same model in different colors, it just strikes me a bit funny. As I turn she throws her bra at my face. I get it off my head and put it over the drawer. She sticks her tongue out at me as she covers her chest with her hands.

"No kidding around, this is serious sanitary business," I joke with a bossy tone.

She laughs softly and turns around, I throw her bra and panties on the bed and sit down after taking hold of the sponge again. I reach down and soak the sponge in water, before bringing it up to the bed I squeeze it a few times, making sure it won't drip anything once I'm wiping the sweat off. As I bring the sponge up Mako moves her hair away from her back.

I begin brushing the sponge on her shoulders, slowly wiping off her sweat. Then her neck, making sure I rub a bit hard just below from where her hairs starts growing. I soak the sponge again and squeeze it, repeating the process I did at the beginning.

"I bet other people would be super embarrassed about this," she mumbles.

"Why?" I ask as I start with her back.

She shifts her position slightly and breathes out pleasantly.

"I don't know, I don't think other siblings are as close as we are," she says.

"Well, that's good no?" I ask, "I mean you wouldn't want to be all smelly because you can't wash your back."

"Haha shut up, I'm not smelly."

"You sure?" I tease, "Hands up,"

She slowly brings her hands up and I scrub her side and armpit while I'm at it. She holds back the urge to get away and just chuckles a little but then she sighs loudly.

"I feel like a big baby though," she says.

"I could…try to be a little less helpful if it hurting your pride or something," I comment.

"It's not that, I just don't want to become a bother to you," she explains.

"It's quite alright, I don't mind at all," I answer.

She chuckles and lets out a relaxed sigh, finishing up with her arms I rinse the sponge again and squeeze it so it doesn't drip. I reach around her and clean her chest, being sure to be quick as she tends to get all embarrassed about it. Getting done quickly with that area in particular, I grab the green bra next to me and pass it to her. She takes a bit to put it on but eventually manages to do so.

"I'm tired of being tired," she says chuckling.

She turns around and I get started on her stomach.

"It tickles," she says.

"You always say it does," I say.

* * *

Done with returning the bucket to the bathroom and putting her dirty clothes on the hamper I walk back into her room.

"You need anything else, madam?" I tease.

"Not at the moment, kind sir," she follows along, "no wait! Bring me some manga from your room, I feel like reading a bit today."

"Alright."

I go back to my room and pick some random manga I have in my shelf, Mako doesn't really have a favorite genre or type of story she just enjoys reading random four koma or a series of anything once in a while. I grab a few at pure random and then bring them back to her. She smiles and thanks me as I leave her room and I go back to the kitchen to wash those dishes I left in the sink. Again, I would make a damn fine housewife. I laugh at the though and put the plates on the rack.

"Now what time is it?" I ask myself as I take out my phone.

The display reads two in the afternoon. Damn, where did my time even go? I make my way to my room quickly.

"Hey I'm going to play now alright?" I yell as I pass my sister's room.

"Ok!" she yells back.

I go into my room and boot up my nervegear, alright let's get this started. I strap it on my head and lay down on my bed.

"Link start!"

Alright, here we go. Random colors blind for a few seconds, then circles appear validating my already calibrated nervegear sense receptors. Language, I select Japanese, and then I'm greeted with a familiar log in screen asking for my information. Without hesitation I type in my information and I'm prompted with an option I have never seen before. It's the screen that leads to character creation but below the option to create a new one I can see that my beta character was kept stored in the system. I feel myself grin but I'm not in my physical body anymore so it clashes quite loudly with my lack of reality check. I go with my previous build and then huge letters welcoming to Sword Art Online appear before my eyes. Let's have some fun. More bright lights blind me again, but this time there won't be more menus after it. I'm standing in a familiar place now. I rub my eyes a little and then look around.

"Oh it's good to be back!" I yell from the top of my lungs.

"It is, isn't it?"

I turn around and see a person I hadn't seen since the end of the beta period. I smile widely and shake his hand, bringing him in for a hug.

"Charles!" I say as I pat his back.

"Heh, thank you god you kept that avatar; if you hadn't, I would never have spotted you so easily." he says.

"You didn't change yours either so that's good," I say with a grin, "wait so you've been like standing around?"

"Kind of," he says, "there's no way I'm playing this alone, friends is what makes it fun. Actually a friend of mine should be logging in shortly I believe."

While I wouldn't go as far as to say this game is boring alone it definitely is much more fun with friends, the beta was a blast I can't wait to get into the full version.

"Hey, I think that's him," he says as he starts walking.

"How can you even spot people on a game where they might as well be anonymous?" I ask.

He shrugs and keeps walking through the main plaza. With flashes of light new players appear before us, their faces smiling and I can sense their excitement as well. A bit in-front of my bald friend I spot a man thrusting his sword into the air like a beginner. I laugh to myself and scratch my nose a little. I will admit I might've done the same, but that was before.

"Wait hang on, let's party up first," I comment.

He stops for a second and quickly going through his menu sends me an invite. I accept it and I see his name appear below mine in my HUD.

"Just like old times," he says.

With a smile he turns around and makes his finals steps to approach the guy blatantly thrusting his sword upwards in the plaza.

"Haha, want to get an orange cursor over your head already?" Charles asks.

The man turns around and with a gleeful face runs over to us.

"Charles!" he shouts as he sheathes his sword in-front of us, "you…you are bald…"

"Indeed I am, and guess what? Charles is my user name once again," he replies while laughing.

I try not to mind too much their lovely reunion as I look around. It almost makes me nostalgic, for reasons I can't begin to explain. I spent a lot of time in this game, more than I am even willing to admit. Mako used to ask me why I looked so tired some days in the morning. The answer was just that I was busy spending time in here, during the beta test at least. It seems she'll be asking me that question again shortly. Maybe I can even get her to try the game.

The amount of people still logging in an hour into the game is astounding, flashes of light every few feet all across the main plaza can be seen, one after the other, players pop in to have the time of their lives, it makes me smile for a reason I really can't explain.

"Oh, I forgot, this other guy with me is…his name is Daath. We met during the beta testing period," Charles says.

I take a step forwards and extend my hand to introduce myself. This man I don't know shakes my hand strongly with a very smug grin. For some reason I don't quite know how to feel about him. I look up at my HUD and see his name has been added to our party and subsequently below my HP bar.

"Pleasure to meet you, Alshep. A friend of Charles is a friend of mine," I say rather elegantly.

"Haha! I knew it! Same character name as always!" shouts Charles.

Alshep grins widely and punches Charles on the arm playfully.

"Shut up, you chose a bald man!" he teases.

I sigh to myself a little seeing how rash this guy is. Reminds me a lot of the class clown back in my school. If he is anything like him…boy is this gonna be fun.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

MORE backstory! This time just a short glimpse into what Daath's life used to be like. I know know, this chapter is a bit short and I'm super sorry about that, but this is the last of the short backstory chapters. Take in mind most of these chapters have been written with months of anticipation. We are fast approaching the end of the second arc of my story, I hope you guys are ready for that. Personally I think my greatest chapters start a little further down the road, I can't wait to hear what you guys think about them.

I'm super glad to see that everyone enjoyed the last chapter a lot. I was a little weary about giving Ruri that much of a spotlight, given she is a bit of a wildcard. Of course this statement might not make much sense because I wrote the chapter. How can she be a wildcard? I hear you ask. WELL! I thought she might've been a little too silly or something, but it seems to have been quite a success with both my beta-reader and you guys so I'm glad.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "A Place of Our Own"


	27. Chapter 27 - A Place of Our Own

**Chapter 27.- A Place of Our Own**

**January/29th/2023**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – City of Barrowdell**

**Alshep**

"It's…n-not that far from here," Esra mumbles shyly as we walk outside the floor's gate.

"Ahhh….I can't believe you didn't tell us sooner," I complain as I walk behind her.

Daath follows me closely from behind and I hear him sigh just as I finish my sentence.

"Man she literally had no obligation to, if anything you should be thanking her," he says.

"Well, I guess you are right…yeah," I reply sheepishly.

Esra traverses the city quite easily despite it being overloaded with NPCs walking all over. She turns her body to the side and slithers in between people almost as if she were used to it. Daath and I clumsily walk around begging pardon to every single NPC we manage to bump into. I had never been to this floor in particular, to be honest I haven't moved much around the floors and mostly favor lower ones with everyone else, but I guess we should in fact start heading up if we want to keep training relevant.

"Damn, she is fast," Daath mumbles as we struggle to keep up.

I guess the city layout doesn't really help either, the streets are cramped and narrow. The buildings stand a bit high and they leave little room to wondering eyes other than the street level. Finally clearing off of what I can only assume is the market district of the city the people out on the street decreases and leaves more room for myself to move around with less care of who I hit or don't.

"Watch what you say around this girl," Daath comments.

"What do you mean?" I ask turning my head a little to look at him.

"C'mon, man, she looks so sensitive, and there you go complaining that she didn't tell us about her property before." he says.

I look down sullenly; I didn't mean to insult her, I was just complaining to the air. After a moment, I sigh and nod to show that I understood his point.

"I will admit I'm quite surprised," Daath sates, "There are only a few quests that allow you to get property and they are either extremely hard to complete or hard to find, or both. The only other way is to get absurd amounts of Col, which isn't an easy feat for anyone, let alone someone who doesn't use weapons."

I guess what he says makes sense, not like I got any info myself to make sure. After all, I just recently found out about the property system. And since then have been going around, doing whatever I can to get Col. I can only deduce that with like any MMO housing and things like that, that are more in the vein of roleplaying would be something to be found as end game content. Then again who ever put us here clearly wants us living in the damn place so perhaps it's more accessible than in other games.

Esra stops at the door of a rather big building, she stands there idly and glances quickly to see if we are coming. The façade isn't something that attracting which is nice in a way, don't really want live in something flashy. The place she is waiting at stands right next to an item shop and has three floors. It's pretty damn huge, spanning wide almost as the inn back in Tolbana. Really makes me wonder what inside looks like.

"Well…this is it," Esra says.

"Damn," Daath says perplexed.

"Y-you don't like it?" she panics.

"No no, this is just…huge," Daath clarifies, "How did you even come to own it?"

"A quest line," she answers shortly.

"Was it hard?" Daath asks.

"No…not really," Esra says and takes out a set of keys.

She walks over to the door and opens it slowly. She unlocks the door and swings it open with quite a bit of effort. As the door swings in a huge amount of dust comes out of the place. It is so much is even becomes visible out in the street.

"It must've been super long then," Daath says after a quick cough. "Ten quests? Twenty?"

"Sixty four," Esra replies and walks inside.

Daath is as still as a statue, likely awestruck.

"Well, damn is the right word, huh?" I tease.

"That's freakin amazing," he says.

I pat his back twice and walk past him and inside the building. Light pours in from the front windows into the foyer. Much like the inn a set of stairs is right on the left corner of the room. Said stairs spiral all the way up, going up all of the three floors. This leaves the entrance feeling wide since the ceiling is high as the stairs themselves. The stairs have two landings, those being the second and third floors. Each one is limited by a railing from which you can look down to the entrance. It feels like the lobby of a hotel to be honest. The first floor, being the one we currently stand on has a huge table. It easily spans eight meters long, on top of it about six candle sticks all of them unbelievably dusty pretty much like the rest of the place.

"Damn," Daath says again, this time his voice echoing through the place.

"How big is this place?" I ask.

"Well…it…it has one kitchen, a dining hall, a small library, spacious cellar, four storage rooms, eight bedrooms," she says but takes a brief pause, "one master bedroom, one grand bath, and a recreation room."

"How? Please tell me how!" Daath begs.

A bit scared by Daath's tone and hand gestures, Esra jumps a little before answering.

"This was a pretty long quest line, most people probably went away before completing it or never found this place."

"Wait you mean this place wasn't just a reward? You also started the quest here?" Daath asks, awfully inquisitive.

Esra takes out a few rags and holds one on her left hand and the other two on her right.

"Could you two please help me clean?" Esra asks. "If you d-don't want to, that's okay; I'm sorry for asking."

"Only if you tell me all about this quest line."

Laughing a little after saying that Daath takes the two rags from her and hands me one. I take it into my hand and turn to lean a little on the huge dining table. I quickly pass it over the dirty table and rid the area of filth. I turn my hand over and see the amount of grime I picked up from just that.

"Holy shit this is a lot of dust," I can't help muttering.

"Yeah, this table in particular gets super dusty all the time," Esra comments.

"All the time?" Daath asks as he starts to clean the table as well.

"I suppose I should explain…"she says.

I walk around the edges of the table, my hand with the rag gliding over it, leaving that satisfactory clean streak behind it.

"This place wasn't always mine, it use to belong to an NPC, Master Galahad, to be precise. I found this place because I was pushed into the door as I was walking around the city. I crashed in, stumbling down and falling face first right at the feet of a maid," she explains. "When I stood up and got a better look I realized she had a quest for me and actually was already asking for my help with something. There were some other maids, probably around four, all with icons over their heads."

"That's interesting…" Daath says, "So if it weren't cause you just got pushed in here you would've never found the place, huh?"

"Pretty much," she replies.

She drags one of the chairs out and getting on her knees starts cleaning it thoroughly. She wipes the legs and then the rest, looking quite happy as she does so.

"Let me take a wild guess," I interrupt, "Did any of those quests involve doing chores…I don't know much like cleaning?"

She looks up at me with a smile and the returns to cleaning the chair.

"Yes, pretty much all of them," she says.

She finishes cleaning the one chair rather quickly and then moves on to the next, repeating the process.

"Some were easy, almost dumb sounding. They asked me to mop the floors, to dust the paintings, clean the stairs, stuff like that. If anyone else found this before I guess they pretty much got discouraged because the quests were dull and the Col and exp you gained from them was minimal." she says.

"Yeah I would totally leave if it only included being a maid," I say turning the rag around to use the other side.

"Oh, speaking of," Esra says suddenly and stands up.

She brings up her menu and clicks some things quickly. Her clothes shine and replacing them appears a maid uniform. A black long dress with frilly ends and complete with a white apron covering most of her front. It looks cute, on her, oddly enough pretty fitting.

She grabs the sides of the skirts and makes a little bow before blushing wildly. Girl probably did not think the outfit change through.

"I..uhh I…this was a quest item…they required for me to wear this from time to time," she says nervously, "It's not like I enjoy wearing it or anything."

"It looks nice on you," Daath says quickly.

There goes his silver tongue again. I chuckle and nod at her as she looks straight at me, looking for someone to back up Daath's comment. Still blushing quite hard she takes out another chair and starts cleaning it as well.

"Ehem…an-anyway, all along the first like thirty quest, all the maids kept saying this was all to keep the master happy. They kept insisting that the master should be happy," she says. "I mean it sounds normal no? Maids should keep their master happy right?"

"Hmm, well yeah it makes sense," Daath says.

"Sounds potentially sexual," I mutter to myself as an odd creepy smile crawl over my face.

I grab one of the candle sticks and clean it as I notice a long drawn out silence. I look up slightly and see Daath and Esra staring me down, Esra blushing probably harder than before and Daath just looking unamused.

"What?" I say with my arms to my sides.

"This guy's dirty mind aside…" Daath mumbles, "please continue."

"I don't remember that well if it was quest thirty two or thirty three but it was around those two that I finally got to meet master Galahad." she says, sounding a bit sad for some reason, "He was a tall bearded man, broad chest and just really…imposing. No wonder why all the other maids respected him, his image alone was just that imposing."

It strikes me a bit odd, to hear her talk about NPCs as if they were people. It just bounced oddly in my head, the way she referred to this Galahad.

"All the other quests from there on out got just a bit more difficult, because I was done getting to know this house I was asked to do more complex things. He made me fix him specific meals, I dare say I got quite skilled at cooking because of it," she says and takes a break, leaning a little on the table.

I finish cleaning the last of the candlesticks and Daath seems to be done with cleaning surface of the table itself. Esra takes a deep breath and pulls out another chair to clean it, since we now stand on the opposite side of the table Daath and I take out some chairs and clean them in the same fashion Esra did.

"I think I like it, the way you are telling it sounds like it was really progressive you know?" Daath says, "Like you started from the bottom started working your way up in the maid's ranks."

"It was a lot like that yeah, most of the maids, by the time I was taking orders from master Galahad, referred to me as ma'am. I was sort of the higher up by then, the other maids occasionally gave me potions, food or just random items they found. It made things easier," she mutters, "It was a bit odd…I grew attached to this place, to the other maids, to master Galahad. NPCs or not his words of kindness after I completed each task felt real. His smile felt real."

The way and tone she says this sounds like she remembers it quite fondly. I won't make fun of that, after all even I have grown attach to a game or two, even cried in few.

"Around quest fifty, master Galahad took ill. Ever since then he stayed in bed, asked me to go look for stuff around town mostly medicine and with a time limit. I developed a knack to go around the crowded district, to go by all those people going as fast as I could. I didn't know what all of this was leading towards to, but by the time I realized it was already too late," she says with a saddened tone.

We finish cleaning all of the table and I just lean over the rest of one of the chair's rest. Daath crosses his arms and clears his throat, I bet he wants to ask the same question I do but he just doesn't have it in him. With an expression matching her tone Esra stands up and wipes her on hands on the cloth.

"What happened next?" I ask, awfully cautious with my tone.

She looks up at me, her eyes looking a bit glassy. She turns around and starts cleaning the nearby shelf, taking out the books and cleaning them one by one. I look at Daath and he just shares my discomfort as we look back at Esra.

"The day I got back for what would be quest sixty four, all the maids were waiting for me here," she says as she looks back at the area between the door and the start of the dinner table, "Each and every one of them politely said goodbye and gave me a gift. They all gave me a part of a unique maid's uniform and begged for me to wear it."

She puts the book she was currently cleaning back on the shelf and opens her menu. Her current uniform shines brightly and changes into something similar, yet different. The black over all color of the dress changes to a wine red and the ends of the apron have golden embroidery all around the ends of it. Also over her head appears a red and white maid headband. It looks very nice and fancy, almost begs to question if it really is a servant's outfit.

"For the last request, master Galahad asked me to go get him some fruit and flowers. His voice was really weak and his tone almost inaudible. I had to lean in close to him to even hear what he wanted. It was then when I realized it was probably the last time I would see him," she says, "Panicking, and running as fast as I could I went to town, looking for the things he asked for. I ran, I ran so fast, the fastest I've ran in my life. I went to the market and bought the fruit but the flowers where nowhere to be found."

She stops her story, her voice starting to sound quite pained at the end of her sentence. She breathes out, even her own breathing sounding heavy. She turns to us and with a serious, non-embarrassed face speaks again.

"Please let's clean all of this before I continue, I beg of you two."

Practically leaving us no other choice I nod and seconds later Daath accepts her conditions vocally. Out of her inventory she takes out an array of house cleaning paraphernalia. A mop, a broom, a bucket of water, a few feather dusters and more pieces of cloth. All out of her inventory and neatly set in front of her.

"Fine fine, let's get to it then," I say.

* * *

I wipe the sweat from my brow, panting heavily-cleaning is by no means easy work. I took off my armor and set my sword over the table downstairs because it got annoying to walk around with that on. I straighten my posture and rest my palm on the top of the mop. Third floor's floor is completely clean and that's thanks to me. I put the mop inside the partially filled bucket and grab the bucket from the floor.

"Alright I'm done up here!" I yell.

Esra quickly peeks out of one of the rooms in the third floor before I go down the stairs

"Alright, I'll be there in a minute," she replies.

As I go down the spiral stair case I can see Daath sitting, if you can call that sitting, on one of the table's chairs. His legs spread out in front of him and he is leaning on a very uncomfortable angle, a piece of dirty cloth covering his face. With a grunt I get off the stair's last step and place the mop close to the nearby wall.

"Man, this place is huge…" Daath grumbles.

"It is, it's pretty nice too," I reply.

"It's freaking amazing," he replies.

I didn't notice any sooner but we are well into the afternoon, barely anymore light floods in through the windows. From the windows you can see Barrowdell night life, and by this I mean lights coming from the street as the city lights up. Still not enough to make the interior of this building any brighter though. I pull a chair out and sit next to Daath, I lean my body over the table and rest my head on its surface. I close my eyes for a few seconds. I feel peaceful…a feeling I haven't felt in a long while. In my own, weird paranoia I lift my head up quickly. Nothing is happening. I'm sitting next to a friend in a darkened room. It's quiet, with the occasional chatter from outside that manages to filter in into the room. I press my palms against my cheeks I almost cannot believe the feeling. Nothing is bothering at the moment. I rub my eyes and see a faint light coming from above me. Esra is coming down the stair probably with a lantern or something.

"It gets quite dark, no?" her question echoes.

I see her walk down the second landing and with a small candle she lights up some lanterns that hang on the walls. As she goes down the hallway she lights up more lanterns and the place starts getting a warmer, colorful feel to it. I see the fruit of my works and smile at how everything in this place looks shiny and almost new.

"Yeah, very," I reply, completely relaxed.

She comes out from the hallway and with the small candle makes it down to the foyer. She slowly goes around the room and lights up everything around the table, the place is now brightly lit and really evokes the feeling of the main hall at the inns. Esra places the candle on the center of the table and then after licking her thumb and index fingers puts the fire out.

"So where was I?" she asks.

Daath jerks his body and properly sits on his chair. I just lean back a little and place my arms over the table.

"You couldn't find the flowers…" Daath mutters.

Esra nods slowly.

"The flowers master Galahad requested from me where nowhere to be found, I tried all of the market and even the outskirts of the city. I went to lower floors even, desperately looking for this particular flower. Where was I supposed to find a golden rose?"

I nod and instead lean my body forwards.

"Hours passed, I was afraid of coming back to master Galahad without what he had requested of me. I stopped to catch my breath on one of the benches near the central plaza of Barrowdell. That's when I realized I did not have a quest tracker for the fruit and flowers. I opened my quests tab and realized there was only one line of text in the quest description."

"What did it say?" Daath asks softly.

"Go back to the house," Esra answers.

Daath's eyes suddenly divert to his feet and then up to Esra, he clearly looks apologetic and sad. By now I mostly get where this story is going but I don't want to jump to conclusions.

"I hurried back, when I got back all of the lanterns were off and as the maids had already left this place felt absolutely cold and empty. I remember I started crying as I ran up the stairs. It probably sounds stupid doesn't it?" she says, that heavy tone returning to her voice.

"I got to the master bedroom, master Galahad was no longer in bed. The bad was empty, on the night stand were only two pieces of paper and a set of keys. Crying my eyes out I walked over to the bed and sat on the edge. I grabbed the first piece of paper. It was a letter from the master. It detailed what had happened to him, he explained how by the time I came back that his illness would've already taken him away from this world. He did not bear the thought of having me there for when it happened. He left me the deed and the keys to this building."

"Wow…geez," Daath mumbles.

"It sounds stupid doesn't it? For me to get all sentimental about it…" she mumbles, "I don't expect you guys to understand, but this place holds a lot for me. Anyone else could've done this quest line. That letter the master left behind could've been directed to anyone else…but in the end it was all for me…"

It would appear once she put on that uniform she became a whole different person, no stuttering, no more absurd shyness. She was sure of her words and she did not leave an ounce of passion out of them.

"No…I get it," Daath responds.

"Yeah it's alright," I second.

She stands up with a smile, even though tears are running down her face.

"Daath, please go get everyone else," she says softly but it also sounds like an order.

Daath promptly gets off his ass and makes his way to the door, leaving me and Esra behind. I turn around and see that she is standing but a few feet away from me. Her hands on top of each other in-front of her as if she was waiting for me.

"Now, Alshep, please follow me. I have something I must show you," she says softly.

I get up and follow her to the staircase, she makes her way up and I follow closely behind her. I can hear her breathing uneasily, probably from the story still.

"Hey…it's alright you know? Who hasn't grown attached to videogame characters?" I ask.

"It's not just that…" she answers, still walking up the stairs.

"Then what is it?"

She stops halfway to the third floor but then keeps going at a way slower pace.

"I had no one until recently, I took solace in these NPCs. In the maids, in my master, they were the closest to friends I had until now," she says.

We get to the third floor and we walk down the hallway to a set of double doors, the master bedroom I presume. She opens them slowly and into view come a big bed and fancy looking night stands at its sides. Walking into the room there's not much else to notice. There's a wash bin and a big desk on the left side of the room. On the right a small coffee table and a sofa.

"This was Master Galahad's bedroom," she explains.

She walks over to one of the night stands and picks up a piece of paper from it.

"And this…the last he left behind."

"The deed?" I ask.

"Alshep, how much do you care about your guild? How much do you care about all the people you've managed to bring together?" she asks seriously.

"A lot, they are my friends. I care because they've endured as much as me, and even though they have stayed hopeful." I say.

"What will you do for your guild? Will you protect them, your so called friends, would you stand in-front of them if they were to be harmed?"

"I would stand in-front of each and every one of them," I say.

"Even if they won't?"

I nod slightly and give her a good old smirk.

"Even if they won't," I huff.

She smiles and holds the piece of paper close to her chest. After a few seconds she raises it in-front of her face and smiles again.

"I never put this in my inventory, the only action you can do with it is re-sign it," she says as she gives me the piece of paper.

I take it in my hands and see that it reads "Property of Galahad Rowbel".

"Wait…you didn't sign it? Like at all?" I ask.

She shakes her head and places her hands in-front of her near her lap.

"This property will be yours, and yours alone," she says.

"Esra…I mean come on this is far too mu-"

She places her index finger on my lips and with a smile steps back.

"I won't take no for an answer. I trust you to lead us all somewhere great," she says.

"Esra…" I mutter.

"I know we don't really talk much, and when I do I can barely keep my composure. This place gives me strength…even if it sounds dumb and illogical. I want to trust you with this place that is so dear to me. You are a good man and I believe in you."

I raise my finger to the document and the option to re-sign it appears. Hesitating a little I press the option and Galahad's name is slowly replaced with mine. I stare at the piece of paper for a bit and smile for some dumb reason. I look up and see Esra politely bowing to me.

"I'll be honored to serve you in any way possible, master," she says.

"Heh, now don't be like that it would be a bit weird…" I say chuckling.

"I will die before I dishonor this outfit," she replies.

"Haha, alright alright," I say.

"I believe you have guests now though," she says and walks over to the open door of the room.

She beckons me over and holds the door behind her.

"This way please."

I chuckle again and walk out of the room. She closes the door behind her and walks behind me as I reach the handrail that overlooks the entrance below. I see everyone standing around together, Owl notices me and waves, making everyone else look up as well. All eleven of us, finally have a place and it's not a shitty inn. I feel great, as if a new person emerged from me. No worries. For the first time in a long while I could feel this is where we belong and nothing and no one could stop us from being here. It all feels very real, my friends, this place, this feeling. This feeling I could only describe as peace. I put my hands on the railing at look at everyone who is looking at me.

"Welcome home guys."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

I know as of now that you guys would be happy with some more action, and there's action to come trust me as you may know now my story tends to lean towards a slower paced development. While I do take pride in my action scenes they aren't as plentiful as I would want them to, BUT they will increase in number, that I promise.

This chapter I hope hits close to home for most of us gamers out there. Who hasn't grown attached to fictional characters, even more so video game characters? If someone tells you no, they are lying and you should not trust them. Anyways, I really hope you guys enjoyed this as I think it opens a new perspective of things about life in SAO. Esra is cute, I like Esra. As always I'm glad to see the usual bunch of people reviewing it makes my little withered heart skip a beat.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "When This is All Over"


	28. Chapter 28 - When This is All Over

**Chapter 28.- When This is All Over**

**February/7****th****/2023**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

**Elina**

"Your mother and sister would totally hate me," he says softly.

"Why?" I ask, as I slip my arm under the pillow.

He turns on his back and stares to the ceiling, his chest rises and then he lets out the air in his lungs.

"Well, for starters, I'm older than you," he mutters.

"But only two years older," I whine, "it's not that much."

"Yeah yeah, but my intentions could be misinterpreted," he says.

I laugh slightly and pull the covers over my legs to warm them.

"Could it not be that you do have some ulterior motives?" I tease.

He quickly turns his head to me, raising an eyebrow and just staring with his mouth open.

"What? No no, geez Elina don't say that. Makes me feel creepy."

"You are a boy after all," I say with a pouty face.

Al sits up and gets out of bed, obviously flustered he walks over to the wash bin on the opposite side to the bed. He splashes water over his face and dries his face quickly with the towel nearby. He sighs loudly and tugs a little at the collar of his shirt.

"Geez, don't be weird like that," he says.

"What? I'm not being weird," I reply.

I pull the covers over every part of my body but my head, making a mess of the bed in the process. Al chuckles and sit on the edge of the bed before letting himself fall on top of my back. Now, unable to move, I stretch with both my arms and legs and yawn very loudly.

"Can't move," I complain.

"I know," he replies.

"Really though, I doubt they'll hate you," I grunt, "there's a huge chance my sister will absolutely love you though."

"Huh? How come?" he asks.

"She is always happy about everything, and I really mean everything."

"Heh…we are really talking about this now huh?" He huffs.

I try hard to turn my body around and only manage to get on my side. He gets off of me and lies down next to me, close to my face. I frown, mostly to myself. I'm upset by the way he said that, but not enough to bother him.

"Is it really that wrong?" I mumble, "Someone's bound to beat this game eventually, right?"

"Yeah but I…I don't want to get my hopes up…I mean I do but…you know," he tries to explain.

"We won't die unless we go looking for trouble," I say.

"Yeah…trouble seems to have a knack for finding us though," he says.

He is trying to avoid talking about the real world, I don't blame him, that's all we did at the beginning after all. I want to talk about it though, I want get to know him, not Al. I want to get to know the person behind Al, the real person. Part of me wants to force his hand but the other part wants to respect his wishes.

"I hope I can properly express what I feel with my next sentence," he says.

He sits up again and turns around to look at me, I sit up as well still covered in sheets and look straight at him.

"I don't want to die…knowing your name," he groans, "Or even worse…I don't want you to die knowing my name."

I remain silent, I think I mostly get what he means, but I the same time I don't want to accept it. I want to meet him later, I want to see him with my own eyes, I want him to see the real me. It pains me a bit that he thinks his future in this game is uncertain. I get it, he is scared and so am I. I haven't stopped being scared, when this place is not out to kill it's the people we share this world with are the ones that are. At least though, at the very least I want to have hope that all of us will make it through.

"Akari," I mutter.

"What?"

"Akari…my name is Kosaka Akari." I say softly, almost as if I didn't want him to hear me.

He suddenly looks uncomfortable and covers his eyes with his palm.

"Elina…no…" he mumbles.

"No! Akari! My name is Akari!"

He makes himself smaller, almost as if he were curling up in a ball. I get closer to him and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Come on…please…" I say, a bit saddened, "My name is Kosaka Akari a, I live in Tama Hills in Kawasaki…"

He perks up his face a little with his eyes closed he smiles just a little.

"I can't believe you actually live that close to me," he says.

I feel happy, real happy. I get closer to him and rest my hands on his knees.

"For real? How close?!"

"Well not exactly super close but I could definitely just take two or three trains to get to you. I live in…I…" he mumbles. "I live in an apartment complex in Chiyoda."

I notice the uncertainty on his tone, and even though I want to complain about it I'm glad he actually came out with it. Now to push it just a bit further, hope fully he won't get mad.

"Akari..." he says softly, "I uh…I like it. It's really pretty."

He smiles and puts his hand on my cheek. I feel my cheeks getting a bit rosy and I feel the urge to pull my head away, but I don't. Actually as stronger urge arises. The urge and feelings are more towards getting closer to him.

"It really fits you," he adds.

"You really think so?"

"Yeah, I really mean it. Light, right? It's perfect."

I blush a bit harder at how he dissects what my name means.

"So…what's your real name?" I ask, knowing well it might not get me any answers.

His expression turns sour yet again. He backs away a bit and sighs, he then scratches the back of his head and looks at me.

"Eli…ok let's say I tell you my name," he says, "What do you really get from that? Even if I know your name now and I told you mine. As long as we are with everyone else I wouldn't be able to call you Akari, nor would you be able to call me Yuu…"

"What?!" I ask, getting a tad bit excited it, "What did you say?!"

He presses hi palm against his forehead and clenches his other hand into a fist. With probably the widest smile in a long while I stare at him.

"Come on, I heard something!" I say joyfully.

He rolls his eyes and sighs again.

"Yuuji," he mumbles, "Akagi Yuuji."

"Yuuji?" I ask surprised.

"What about it?"

"You don't look like a Yuuji," I say.

He laughs and with his fingers flicks my forehead, I bring my hands up to rub my forehead and kick him a little from where I'm sitting at. He grabs my leg and pulls my closer to him, I turn my body around and try to pull myself away but can't. He pulls me close and I end up sitting on his lap, he embraces me, hugging me from behind and sighs.

"I wonder how long your hair is right now," he says randomly.

"I wonder how long YOUR hair is right now," I say and reach behind him to pull on his hair a little.

He complains a little and then yawns. I yawn as well and rest my back on his chest, I feel his warmth spread over my back and smile as I lean more on him. Ever since we moved to this place in Barrowdell I've learned to appreciate the warmer climate on other floors. It's so cold up here compared to Tolbana or Taft.

"I wonder…I only know about two hospitals over there. Tama Central…or maybe Sakuragaoka, wonder where you might be." he says softly next to my ear.

"Hehe, why are you suddenly a directory?"

"Just some research I had to do for school. Some really dumb group project."

"Probably Tama Central…it's the closest one to my house…spent a lot of time there too…"

"Oh…" he mutters and places his right hand on top of my thigh, "right…sorry."

"It's alright," I say placing my hand on top of his and then chuckle slightly, "So…mister-I-know-everything-about-hospitals. Just where might you be?"

"Sannō Hospital…probably. Hell, maybe even Toranomon Hospital…" he says.

"I wonder where everyone else lives," I say, "or what their names are."

"We can't let this go out though, It has to be just between us Elina." he says

"Right right…I get it Alshep," I say putting emphasis on his handle.

"Oh come on now since when do you even call me that? It's always been Al," he groans.

"I like Yuuji better though," I say, pouting.

I turn around and wrap my arms around his neck, still sitting on his lap my legs now go around him as we look at each other face to face.

"I like Akari better too," he says softly, "but we can't just go changing our rules."

I lean in close to him, my cheeks feeling hotter as I do so. He chuckles softly and puts his hands on my hips.

"Rather frisky today, aren't you?" he teases.

"Oh shush," I murmur close.

I get closer, leaning my body closer to his, feeling his warm embrace. I tilt my head slightly and close my eyes as I part my lips open a little, getting ever closer to his. Then someone knocks loudly on the door.

"Blehhhh…" I whine and get off him.

He laughs a little and stands up from the bed, he reaches the door quickly enough and I bundle myself in the covers again, my face feeling hot and my heart beating fast. I hear him open the door as I cover my head with a pillow.

"Master Alshep," Esra says, "What are today's plans?"

"Geez…Esra, that's not going to stop, is it?" he says.

"Not as long as I wear this uniform."

"Fine," he says and sighs loudly, "uh I don't know we might just go out of the city, level up a little. Want to tag along?"

"I will take care of the guild house, thank you for having me in your thoughts though," she replies. "Can I come in to clean up?"

I sit up and turn around to look at the door. I smile and wave my hand from under the covers. Esra stands at the door, with that pretty red uniform of hers. Her face flushes and her mouth pops wide open.

"Ohh…Oh!" she exclaims, "I…I I'm so sorry, I…ohh…I'll ta-take my leave sorry!"

"Wait…how's this a surprise?" he asks but Esra runs away embarrassed before hearing him out.

I laugh soundly and cover my mouth to stop it quickly.

"See? Even she thinks you are up to stuff," I say.

"Yeah that'll be fun to clear up," he grunts and closes the door.

"I thought she knew though…" I say and fall back on the bed with my back.

"We aren't all that touchy feely in-front of everyone," he says, "But yeah it's not like we are hiding anything..."

"Well yeah but I guess we aren't as obvious in public like Daath and Aeri."

"Heh, when did you find out?" he asks.

"Ages ago-they're super obvious!" I say as I throw my arms into the air.

"I found out not long ago, it was a bit funny."

I laugh a bit and then slowly fall on my back. This bed is the best, it's so big and fluffy. I guess even in virtual reality one needs to have better tastes than an uncomfortable inn bed. Esra's reveal as the one maid to rule them all also came along with its set of perks. She cooks excellent tasting food and keeps this massive guild house tidy. Al crouches down at the feet of the bed and opens the chest that rests there. Shortly after he closes it and stands up wearing a gray jacket along with some wine red pants I've never seen before. He swipes his menu open and with a look of discomfort swipes through tabs and tabs of stuff.

"Something wrong?" I ask as I roll on my stomach.

"I can't get all that used to the new things on the menu…" he mutters, "sheesh I thought guild management tabs were already a pain, owning a building just adds more things to it."

"I just noticed a few days ago that I have access to a shared inventory," I say opening my menu. "Esra has been placing sweets in here since then."

I select an item labeled "red bean bun" and exactly that, along with smell and looks materializes on my hand. I can feel my smile widen absurdly in joy as I see it.

"It's been so long since I had one of these!" I say.

I'm about to take a bite out of it when Al takes it away from my hand. I bite into thin air and turn my gaze at him, frowning. He chuckles and takes an enormous bite out of it leaving but a little bit of the bun left. I try to reach for what's left as he munches on what's on his mouth but he stops me by putting his free hand on my face.

"Well I'll be damned, it tastes just like the real thing," he says.

"Then let me have some!" I whine as I struggle helplessly to reach what's left of the bun.

He sits on the bed close to me and holds what's left of it on his hand close to my face.

"Say ahhh," he says.

I stare at him trying to make annoyed my face allows me to.

"Really now?" I scorn.

He smiles almost smirking at me, almost laughing actually.

"Come on," he says.

I roll my eyes and lean forwards supporting myself with my arms as I get closer.

"Ahhh…"

He slowly puts what's left of my treat in my mouth and I push myself closer to bite down on his finger. I manage to get his index finger and bite down quite harshly on it. I look up at him and see him react to it poorly compared to what I was expecting. He just stares indifferently at me. Suddenly the door swings open and in walks Daath along with Kayla.

"Hey man, so what are we going to do today? I would like to as-" He says as he stares.

Daath chuckles briefly and turns his body around with an exaggerated motion. I suddenly realize I still have my mouth attached to Al's fingers. Along with my current pose, a brief notion of what's being misinterpreted here crosses my mind.

"I understand that you two are a couple, but sharing a room calls for decency," Kayla says before turning around, "I shall leave you two to your carnal desires"

"W-wait!" I shout be she is already closing the door behind her.

After the sound of the door closing we find ourselves in a dead moment of silence. I turn around to look at Al, my face surely flushing cause I can feel how hot my cheeks are. His face is just like if he were laughing but he is not making any sounds. After a second or two he completely loses it and chortles loudly as he swings his body to face away from me.

"Holy shit, ahahaha this is just too good!" he laughs.

"Shut up shut up shut up!" I squeak rapidly at him.

Hurried steps suddenly echo from outside the room and the door busts open a little. Aeri peeks in and tilts her head to look at us. Her eyes inquisitive and her expression filled with mischief.

"I heard you two were up to lewd business?" she teases.

"Get out!" I yell as I throw a pillow at the door.

The thing doesn't even make it halfway to the door and Aeri begins laughing.

"Nice throw," she says.

I get off the bed and run towards the door, grabbing the pillow as I pass by it. Aeri swings the door open and strikes a pose as I get close to her.

"Out out out!" I yelp as I swing the pillow blindly in-front of me.

I feel my arms stop as I hit something hard. Right on! I open my eyes and realize I hit Esra square in the face when she was merely sweeping outside the room. I quickly drop the pillow and back away as she remains motionless. She turns to me, her expression devoid of the usual shyness or warmth she always displays.

"Master Alshep," she utters as she extends her hand towards the open door of the room.

After a few seconds a pillow finds it way flying towards her hand and she grips it tightly.

"Knock yourself out!" I hear from inside the room.

"N-no no wait I…I didn't mean to get you I…I," I stutter and take a small jump back as she takes her first swing at me.

With her feet she kicks my pillow up from the floor and I barely catch it but a mere inch away from my face.

"I will not be bullied while I perform my duties!" she says with over exaggerated deep voice.

I hear Aeri laugh behind me and turn just to see her jump off the hand rail towards the first floor.

"Pillow fight!" she announces loudly.

"W-what?!" I say.

I duck just in time to avoid Esra trying to swing at my head. I turn my body and head towards the stairs. Almost tripping I start making my way down the second floor. I start heading down the hallway and a nearby door bursts open. Out comes Owl sporting a pillow on each hand. He turns to me and smiles kindly with his eyes close. I find some sudden relief and slowly make my way to him as I hear Esra coming down the stairs. I'm almost a foot away from Owl when he speaks.

"I hope you are ready," he says with grin.

He moves his hulking body and throws a pillow with amazing strength at me. Surprised I trip and fall on my back, this gives me an excellent view of his pillow flying but a few inches from my face and hitting Esra's stomach as she makes it to the floor we are on.

"What is going on?!" I cry and get up on my feet.

Taking a few notes from Aeri I place my hand on the hand rail and swing my body over it. I get to the first floor in a short second and roll on the floor as I fall near the table.

"Gotcha!" Esra bellows as she lunges herself at Owl.

I crawl a few feet and suddenly find myself at someone's feet. Clumsily place my hand on the brown boot. I look up only to see Kayla, holding a body pillow just like I would see Al holding a two handed sword. I just chuckle this time around, accepting my fate.

The last I hear before getting smacked in the face is Regi's cries for help as he begs for mercy. A little over his voice you can hear Yu laughing loudly. Who said mornings aren't fun?

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

I'M SO SORRY ABOUT THIS CHAPTER. I KNOW NOTHING AT ALL REALLY HAPPENS BUT I THOUGHT EVERYONE DESERVED A BREAK FROM DANGEROUS AND OR DEPRESSING SCENARIOS! (Also I'm not particularly proud about this chapter because I would sort of file it under…fluff?) In other words, chapters like these I'm not used to writing and I'm not sure about its final quality. Mangachiaki, my beta reader, very kindly said the following when I expressed my worries about this chapter though.-

"Considering that fluff isn't your genre of choice, it's impressive that you managed to turn out a chapter that was still good, despite being outside your comfort zone. Versatility is a desired but miserably rare trait in the fiction business! :3 Have a nice day~~~"

So other stuff today, I would like to announce that we are just 3 chapters away from closing up Arc 2 (Season 2 as I like to think of it). I would like to hear what you all think about my story so far, I know at the very least about…35 people return to read my story when I update. But only about like 3 ever leave review. This is well and all after all I believe I'm in no position to complain but I do sort of want to hear more you know? I might be stepping out of line with this comment so be sure to ignore me if you want. As always below is my parting message and next chapter's teaser.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "She Who Tames Beasts"

(I will come out with it now Silica will not make an appearance : ( That cool stuff is reserved for Arc3!)


	29. Chapter 29 - She Who Tames Beasts

**Chapter 29.- She Who Tames Beasts**

**February/12****th****/2023**

**Twenty Fourth Floor of Aincrad – Panareze**

**Daath**

"This place is seriously the prettiest floor so far," Aeri says besides me.

"I'm not going to argue that for a second," I reply.

We stare in the distance at the assorted amount of man-made islands as we stand in at the very edge of town. The sun reflects nicely off the lake and you can see players and NPCs walking in the distance through the small roads that connect each island to each other. It does make for the best view so far. No matter how much I like Lobria's more arid vistas this is definitely the best.

"Aren't we a little high?" Ruri asks and briefly laughs, "For our level I mean?"

I turn to her slightly and see her balancing her dagger on the tip of her finger.

"Nah you guys should be alright, just have to be careful," I reply.

She nods slowly and turns around, throwing the dagger and catching it gracefully. She sheathes it on her hip and stretches as she yawns loudly. Kato sits leisurely beside Regi on the floor. They seem to be talking but I'm not concentrating that much to eavesdrop.

"So what's this quest about?" Yu asks from behind me.

"As far as I know it's a fetch quest," I explain, "a really hard one though, it's timed and we have to cover a lot of ground in a few minutes."

I look around and signal for Kato and Regi to get off their asses with my hand. They nod and stand adjacent to me. They unequip their weapons and start stretching. I look past them and see more groups of players hanging around; they are probably waiting for the same thing we are.

"And as you can see, we are not the only ones trying to get this done," I say.

Yu looks around and notices all the people lining up along with us. He crosses his arms and chuckles; he is the kind of person that is always up for a challenge. The quest itself is quite simple-it's the conditions that make it hard. According to information I got from Argo this is a quest that is only available once every three days. The objective is to secure three precious stones. The catch is that only nine stones appear on this floor, meaning only three parties or individuals get to actually complete the quest.

The reason why this quest has attracted so much attention is the rewards for the winners: five random rare items varying from armor, clothing, materials, weapons, to even, and this is according to unverified rumors, a unique skill. But this quest can only be attempted once, either by an individual person or by a party. It's even more nerve-wracking because of other players' desperation. When the stakes are this high, there's no telling what people will do to steal stones from each other.

"How do we know when we should get moving?" Aeri asks.

"Quest description says to wait here for the stones to reveal themselves," I utter and scan around in the distance.

Past the little islands and I concentrate towards the thick forest tree line. Suddenly an intense red glow is seen on of the pillar like islands and the quest description quickly changes to "seek out the stones." I'm about to step forwards when a massive shadow is casts itself over me. I turn, only to see a massive lizard-like monster leap over me. It stomps the ground in front of me and I can see a green haired individual riding the massive thing. Much like an absurdly oversized komodo dragon the beast quickly starts heading to towards the red glow.

"Go! Go!" I yell and start running towards the above water island.

Kato in a mad sprint manages to get a little ahead of me as I hear the others and pretty much all the players who were waiting running behind me. Trying to keep a steady speed I look over my shoulder and see that everyone in our group managed to stay close behind me. Ruri struggles a little but with a change on her expression she quickly starts to catch up to Kato who is a little in front of me.

About twenty other players sprint like wild animals through the small road leading up to the island with the red glow. I see the player riding a beast get quite a bit of a head start on us as she already reaches the base of the island. She stands up on her beast and gracefully slides to its tail. As if rehearsed the beast swings its tail up, easily launching her into the air, where she glided until she landed at the very top of the island. It's not particularly high, but it's seven meters of climbing if you don't have a pet like hers or someone with Kato's superhuman strength. We manage to get there heaving and some players jump into the water to start climbing the base of the island. I look around nervously and point my finger at Kato.

"Throw Ruri!" I order.

"Wha-" Ruri yelps.

In a seconds notice he grabs Ruri from her pants and top and swings her up. Reacting quickly she takes out her daggers and stabs the pillar-like formation.

"Assholes!" she yells before starting to climb quickly.

He didn't throw her that far up but at least she has a big advantage on the others now. Just as Ruri is about to reach the top the green haired girl jumps down and lands right on her monster's back. She looks at me and smiles widely. She winks at me and with her hand slaps the lizards behind.

"Onwards!" she sings out joyfully.

The monster roars loudly and starts slithering away towards the forest tree line where I now notice a faint blue glow.

"Watch out!" Ruri yells.

I look up just in time to see her falling and catch her. Stumbling back a bit I set her on her feet and she shows me a ruby as big as her face. She smiles and starts running towards the tree line. We start following her promptly and Aeri matches my pace. I glance at her quickly and smile. Her cheeks get a tad bit rosy as she smiles back.

"This is quite intense!" she yells.

"Yeah! Gets the blood pumping! Wooo!" Yu howls as he passes between us.

Aeri chuckles and I laugh. Running in here can get really exhilarating; it's the only time when you can get tired or anything close to the feeling. I think it's mainly cause of the feeling of steps right after the other and how we force ourselves to breathe in and out harshly even though we aren't really getting any kind of exercise done. It's quite vitalizing in a way.

Ruri sprints past the rest of us, determined to keep pace with the girl atop the lizard. We get past the tree line and suddenly we are moving left and right as we move to avoid crashing into trees.

"There!" Kato says.

He points to the top of a tree that stands tall with a blue glow on top of it. I look around and see a set of branches that is so laughably accessibly from the floor that I almost wonder if they were placed there for me to jump on top of. I jump to a tree and kick myself up to reach the first branch; after that, it's basically a set path of branches that ever so conveniently lead up to the top of the tree I want to get to.

I'm just two branches away from getting there, I already can see three massive sapphires protruding from the top of the tree. Out of nowhere the green haired gal just climbs up from the other side of the tree. I jump and stretch my arm to secure one of the sapphires, just as I do she grabs one and seconds later another player comes up and grabs the last one. The green haired girl looks at me again with a smile and I just now realize how scanty her clothes are. Sporting what I can only describe as a tattered bra and really short shorts she laughs and falls backwards off the tree. I get up quickly and look down. I see her already mounting her monster again and she speeds off to the last faint glow in the distance. I see everyone else waiting for me at the base of the tree and I point towards the last glow.

"Go! I'll catch up!" I yell.

They all nod and start heading towards the last stone. I jump forwards to a nearby branch and get hold of it with my hands. I swing a little and the fall to lower branch. Finally getting closer to the ground I let go and roll as soon as I hit the floor. I recover quickly and start running again. Getting closer to Regi I can see we approach a clearing in the thick woods. We come out to a patch devoid of trees with a small hill in-front of us.

"Is it here?" I ask as I stop to catch my breath.

"Daath…" Aeri mutters, "It's them…"

Breathing in deeply I look up and see a group of about ten people, all of them wearing white armor and or clothing. Leading the parade just in the middle lays a familiar figure. A man with a shit eating grin, hair as red as fire. I never actually seen the man this closely but Al paints a lovely picture.

"Well well well…" the man says, "if it isn't my favorite bunch of assholes."

"Klaus…" Aeri mutters.

So this is the guy… I never got the chance to look this closely at his ugly mug. I can see Kato, Regi, Yu, and Ruri standing back, looking confused as hell. I don't blame them, I guess we forgot to tell them about this. Not like I expected it to pop up again.

Klaus spreads his arms open and laughs loudly as he walks over to us, taking small steps. A glow diverts my sight to his feet and I see two big emeralds lying at his feet. He bends over and picks one up. He throws it up and down a short distance from his hand and mockingly presents it to us.

"You guys looking for this?" he says with a smirk.

"Hey it's over here!" A voice shouts from behind.

A group of four players comes out from the woods behind us and go past us quickly. They see Klaus' gang and stop dead on their tracks. Shuffling around aimlessly the group of players stays their ground just in-front of the White Snakes.

"Hey we just want a stone, please let us through," a boy pleads.

"Oh, geez. Why didn't you say so sooner?" Klaus replies and steps back.

The group of players eagerly move towards the last stone and I just smell something beyond fishy. I glance quickly at Aeri and she looks panicked.

"Hey wait!" she shouts.

Klaus smiles and snaps his fingers. Without warning all of his henchmen unsheathe their weapons and jump on the naïve group of players. I see Ruri and Kato stand back, they quickly equip their weapons and stand ready to attack. In a matter of seconds what is left of the four players is only faint traces of crystals. We didn't even have time to react. No time to help.

I find myself with my sword already unsheathed and desperately digging into my pockets looking for crystals. Now panicking I bring up my menu and quickly select my teleportation crystals. I have four of them. I take them out and see Klaus react to the situation. He swings his arm over his head and his people begin closing in on us.

"How boring!" he yells, "I thought you would stay and play, and just where the hell is that idiot that's always hanging around with you!? My dearests of friends Alshep. Where is he?!"

"Kato, Ruri, Regi, Yu!" I yell.

They turn around quickly and I just toss the crystals at them, with little problem all four of them manage to catch the crystals. Kato and Yu look a bit angered but Regi and Ruri quickly understand the situation.

"We can handle them!" Kato says angered.

"Yeah!" Yu echoes.

"This is not your problem guys," I huff, "now get the hell out of here, split up, we'll meet later."

Ruri and Regi nods and quickly sheathe their weapons.

"Teleport Lobria!" Ruri yells and disappears out of sight.

"Teleport Frieven!"yells Regi.

Now only Kato and Yu remain, Kato staring intensely at me as if insulted. Sorry mate, not your fight. Yu just avoids my gaze and seconds later disappears from the scene.

"Teleport Taft!"

"God dammit…you idiots better come back alive!" Kato fumes, "Teleport Urbus!"

"Ok, now our crystals," Aeri says as she approaches my side.

I see the multitude of white clad people getting closer, weapons at the ready, that cowards Klaus with the green cursor staying behind as other people do his dirty work. I clear my throat and reluctantly turn my head to Aeri.

"About that…" I mutter.

"You have to be kidding me…" she replies with disappointment.

I just nod at her response as we both start to slowly back away from Klaus' goons.

"So we are going to die huh?" she asks, almost sounding sarcastic.

"Well at least we'll die together," I joke, trying to lighten the mood as well.

"How romantic," she teases, "You never were one to take me out on picnics, or regular dates. You know, like normal people do?"

She chuckles loudly and readies a sword skill, I do as well and suddenly the whirring noise becomes the loudest thing I can hear for some reason. Still, her voice cuts through the noise, reaching me, words only meant for me.

"Well…if it has to be this way…right now…" she struggles, "Thank you for everything…I…I… I lo-"

I smile a little, kind of knowing where her sentence is heading. Rather early I would say, but at the end of my life I will regret it if I don't say it right now.

"I love you too," I say.

I turn to her quickly and see her smile widely with rosy cheeks. She nods with her eyes closed and then opens them again, looking fiercer than ever. I turn to the white clad players and place my sword in-front of me. I'm ready. I might not come out alive, but if I'm going down, I'm going down fighting.

"Yaaahhooooo!"

A monster jumps over us swiftly, on top of it that already familiar looking girl. She laughs as her monster hits the ground and turning around the massive beast hits the line of players approaching us with its tail. Sending them flying over to their right they all groan and complain as they hit the ground. Taken by the moment both Aeri's and my skill deactivate and go into cool down. The monster-riding girl approaches us and stretches her hand out towards to us.

"Hiii! Get on we are leaving," she says gleefully.

I place my hand on Aeri's back and gently push her, she reacts accordingly and grabs the girls hand. The girl pulls her up easily and then points her hand towards me again. Taking a second to look over her lizard like thing I see Klaus, he is pissed and he is charging towards us with a sword skill cooking. I grin widely and give the girl my hand as she pulls me up. I sit behind Aeri and turn around as the girl directs her monster away from the White Snakes. I laugh loudly and salute the poor fucker good bye as he tries to catch up to us.

"I'll get you! I swear one day I will get you and all of your damn friends!" he screams.

I place my hands on Aeri's hips as I steady myself to look forwards. The beast's pacing almost feels like a horse galloping but a bit more sluggish. It beats running though. Aeri turns her head around and leaning back and pulling my face towards she kisses me deeply. Seconds later she stops and then yells excitedly from the bottom of her lungs. I guess we all need our stress relief. Aeri then moves forwards and hugs the rider tightly.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" she says in quick succession.

The girl giggles and turns her head around, she smiles widely and brightly at us.

"No need to thank me," she says, "thank Edelwiess."

"Edel-who?" Aeri answers.

"Edelwiess!" the girls says and pats her monster's neck.

The thing growls up at the sky and then keeps running straight through the woods. Soon enough we are out of the woods and back to the narrow straights of land that connect the little islands and Panazere in the middle of it all.

"So where are we going, ya love birds?" the rider asks.

I chuckle slightly and tilt myself to the side to look ahead.

"If you don't mind, please take us to Panazere's gate plaza," I say.

"Aye aye!" she says with an overly joyous tone.

It takes us little time to reach the main plaza in Panazere. This reptile thing is pretty useful. Once there I jump off and help Aeri get off of it as well. The rider jumps down as well and stretches her arms out.

"I'm glad I got you out of that pickle," she says with a smile, but then her expression changes to a grim one, "wish I've done something sooner though…"

I feel her regret weigh down on me a little. She must've been waiting behind the tree line for the right moment to do something. She probably also watched as those players got killed right in front of us. She looks at the floor for some brief seconds not saying a thing. She then sighs and climbs back on "Edelwiess". The sudden urge to do something stupid revolves around my head.

"Hey uh…uhm," I say, "would you like to come over to our guild house? I don't know how safe it is for you to be alone right now."

Aeri looks at me raising an eyebrow for a moment. I just shrug my arms at her and then she nods.

"I think that would be nice," the green haired girl says.

"Alright then, I'm Aeri."

Aeri extends her hand towards the girl and the girl pulls her in for a hug. Hugging her tightly the girl giggles and Aeri just freezes awkwardly in the exchange of affection. The girl lets go from the hug and with her hands on Aeri's shoulders she sets her a little away from herself.

"I'm Twyla, nice to meet you!" she sings.

I laugh and extend my hand to her.

"Daath, nice to meet you," I say.

She pulls me in as well for tight hug, almost feeling crushed I pat her back and struggle to laugh past her arms tightening around my body. She lets go of me shortly after and also with her arms on my shoulders sets me to the side.

"Haha, alright, just follow us, we are going to Barrowdell," I explain.

"Oh, floor seventeen?" she asks, "I was there just this morning."

"Great then you know where to go," I answer softly.

Aeri approaches the gate and seconds after she is already gone. I do so as well and select floor seventeen on the gate's menu. I start hearing loud voices all around, clear signals that I'm already in Barrowdell. Twyla teleports shortly after me and I begin leading her through the crowded afternoon street. Taking a few notes and hints from our resident maid, I swerve and turn as the NPCs walk around, smoothly traversing the crowded area. I reach the guild's façade and lean on the wall, I turn around, hoping to see Twyla struggle to walk by. Instead I see her happily riding her giant lizard, pushing NPCs and people alike as she just moves through the thick of the crowd.

"Wait…so what's the deal with that?"

She stops next to me and tilts her head as if confused.

"Edelwiess is my beast, I tamed him," she says.

"I didn't know you could tame things this big," I comment.

"Me neither, if I'm honest about this," she says and hops off Edelwiess, "I just threw meat at this little boy until he approached me."

"That simple?" I ask.

"I wouldn't say simple…the area where these little babies spawn is really dangerous so I was playing a dangerous game," she says and laughs, "But in the end I came out winning."

Right after she says so she begins scratching Edelwiess' chin and the massive monster almost purrs like a cat. It slowly moves its neck close to Twyla's face and rubs his face against hers. Twyla laughs some more and like the monster starts nuzzling it like a pet.

"Anyways, this is our guild house," I say proudly.

She looks up and whistles as she ganders at the size of our nifty building.

"Neat place," she says and hops back on Edelwiess' back.

I turn around and open the door leading inside. Steeping through the doorway I suddenly feel safe and comfortable. Having a place to really call home is way different than just going into different inns all the time. I like it. Scratch that, I love it.

Everyone else is sitting at the table, probably waiting for Esra to fix everyone something to eat. Al, Kayla and Elina wave at me and I wave back. Further down the table I can see everyone else, it's good to see they made it back here safely.

"Daath!" Ruri yells, somehow managing to sound unexcited and completely monotone.

She jumps towards me and wraps her hands around my neck. She hangs from there, lifting her feet from the ground and putting her face awkwardly close to mine. She just hangs from there, looking straight into my eyes.

"Uh…what are you doing?"

"Making your girlfriend jealous," she answers and pushes her face closer, making our noses touch.

"Well is it working?" I ask.

Ruri is suddenly yanked off of me and falls on her butt as Aeri claps her hands together. She sighs and then crouches down to forcefully pinch Ruri's cheeks.

"Ahhh…ahhh stop," Ruri pleads.

"This is quite the lively place," Twyla comments as she and her beast squeeze through the door.

Esra comes out of the kitchen with two massive trays, one on each hand filled with food and drinks. Looking at the entrance she quickly drops them once she sees our news guests. She shrieks loudly and in less than a second she is standing up on a freed up chair. Elina quickly glances at the entrance and jumps up with Esra, they both stand on top of a chair, holding hands and shrieking at Twyla's pet.

"Yeah, the chair is totally going to save you from the giant lizard," Al teases.

"Kill it master, kill it!" Esra yells.

"Haha calm down," I say, "this is Twyla, she is a beast tamer, and this is well…her beast."

"Edelwiess!" Twyla yells.

Edelwiess growls loudly and swings its tail around as if presenting itself.

"To what do we owe the pleasure?" Kayla asks.

"She saved us from Klaus' gang," Aeri quickly admits.

Al quickly stands up from the table, his chair falling backwards as he does so.

"What? Where?!" he asks.

"Floor twenty four," Yu says.

"That bastard, what did he do?" Al questions.

"Calm down man, we are ok, that's all that matters," I say, hoping to calm him down.

"Wait, you've run into that silly looking dude before?" Twyla asks.

Al crosses his arms and frowns, looking obviously mad and enraged by the topic of discussion.

"We've had a little more than just run-ins with that asshole," he says.

Aeri and Elina both silently nods, Al approaches me and Twyla and for some reason suddenly looks very satisfied. He smiles with that smug grin of his and puts his hand on my shoulder.

"Anything to make that bastard have a bad day is great on my book," he says, "Esra, fix a place for Twilight."

"Twyla," the girl complains.

"Right, sorry. Also make something for her pet Ezequiel."

"Edelwiess!" Twyla groans.

"Right, let's have ourselves a nice night!" he says.

Still scared, Esra gets off of the chair and runs back to the kitchen. Elina follows her closely behind just to get away. I walk over to the table and sit next Owl, Aeri comes running and sits next to me with a smile. This ought to be a fun night.

Soon the table is plagued by small talk and me and Aeri explaining to Al and the rest how we managed to get away, barely escaping thanks to Twyla. Everyone seems happy, and I'm surprised at how Al didn't get all mad and pissy about the whole deal. After a while Esra and Elina come out of the kitchen with trays of food and set them neatly over the table for us to enjoy the nice meal. The afternoon soon turns into night and we find ourselves with empty plates, full mugs of ale and overall satisfaction.

"That's when I kicked him the poor man on the face for staring up my skirt."

Al crosses his arms and turns away trying to deny Kayla's story. Elina with her mouth open in awe hits Al's on the arm. Everyone else laughs and then even Al laughs and Elina chuckles at the story. Reginald just loses it, he hits the table and even knocks his own ale as he tries to stop laughing.

"Hey, shut up, you are no better!" Al coughs.

"Haha, at least I don't get caugh!" Regi replies without thinking.

Every singly girl on the table turns to Regi with a creeped out and annoyed expression. Regi quickly realizes his mistake and clears his throat. Ever so lady-like Ruri breaks the uncomfortable silence.

"You like what you see?" she asks with overly sexual tone and then everyone starts laughing again.

We eventually quiet down and Regi stands up, looking a bit embarrassed.

"I'm going to my room!" he states nervously.

"Oh baby, please don't leave," Ruri begs.

"Ah, shut up!" Regi replies and runs off to his room upstairs.

"Man, you guys seem to have a lot of fun," Twyla comments.

Al looks around the table a little and with his ale in hand leans forward. He takes a good long sip and then clears his throat after swallowing.

"I like to think we do," he says.

"Awesome, how do I join?" Twyla ponders.

Taken a bit by surprise Al straightens up on his seat and looks around the table, everyone looking as confused as he probably feels.

"Uhm…I uhh…well, what can you bring to the table?" Al asks.

Twyla giggles and places her hand on top of Edelwiess who is now sleeping on top of three trays of food that Esra prepared for it.

"Fair enough…" Al says after a light chuckle.

* * *

**February /13****th****/2015 2:24 am**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad - Barrowdell's Main Plaza**

**?**

"Who would've guessed these assholes set up a place here," the man in white comments, "why didn't you come to me with this information any sooner? And that little trick you pulled outside Panazere…"

"It would've complicated things. Besides, it was Al's fault, since he told me to go away," I answer, "But you now know where they are, even if it took me a while to give you the information."

"Al?" he ponders, "You aren't getting comfortable, now are ya?"

I stare at him and cross my arms.

"Tsk," I exclaim.

The man pushes his red hair to the side and laughs with a big smirk. He emerges from the darkened alleyway and extends his hand to shake mine. I refuse and stay my ground just about two feet away from him.

"I trust the deal, goes on as previously agreed?" He asks.

I refuse to shake his hand and rest mine on the nearby wall.

"I'm not shaking hands until I get my end of the deal," I huff.

"Don't you dare back out-after all, your little thief friend is in on it too." he says.

"Trust me I know my end of the deal, I just hope you can keep yours, Klaus," I say, growing tired of this guy's face.

He laughs in a goose-bump inducing macabre way and then looks at me, straight in the eye, without even blinking.

"Oh, trust me I will."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

And with this the train has left the station and don't expect it to stop until Arc 2 is done. I will kindly suggest that if you want to take a wild guess to avoid doing it in the reviews, we don't want people getting spoiled. All common courtesy and what not. Thanks for the support on my previous chapter I honestly thought it wasn't good haha...BUT I'm glad apparently some people really didn't it was that bad.

Two chapters to this arc! Are you guys ready? I'm not. Haha. I hope the wait isn't that excruciating for next week. Then again, I'm assuming most of you that read so far will be hype about the next chapter. I will update characters bios and the drawings soon since some of you have already asked me about it through PMs just give a bit of time haha.

Please leave any kind of comments, thoughts and or questions in the reviews. If you leave a question I will try to promptly answer it via PM or if you guys want I will answer them on these ANs I have at the end of the chapters in case you are curious about other people's questions. Really just leave in the reviews anything you like, I love having interaction with people that enjoy my story and hearing what you guys have to say about it overall.

Thank you for reading! See ya soon!

Next Chapter: "The Thief and The Lair"


	30. Chapter 30 - The Thief and The Liar

**Chapter 30.- The Thief and The Liar**

**February/20****th****/2023**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House**

**Daath**

"I don't know, I find it a little hard to believe," I confess.

"Are you saying I'm ugly or something? Or that I don't have a lovely singing voice?"

"Well for starters I haven't heard you sing once. But really? An idol? Never would've guessed."

"Well it's not like I was big or anything I just did photo-shoots most of the time, had an EP," she says, "Actually a bit before SAO I had my first gig."

"Right, right."

I breathe out slowly and look up at the somewhat dirty ceiling, odd considering I thought Esra to be quite thorough about cleaning. I feel as I run out of bed on my end. With half my back off the mattress I struggle to get some balance.

"Geez stay on your side," I mutter and push Aeri away from me a little.

"But it's coldddd!" she groans and gets closer to me again.

I sigh and place my hands behind my head in surrender.

"Why do we get a small bed and Al and Elina get that huge one?"

"Al is guild leader," I answer quickly.

"Aww, but what about you, you were our leader first," she says as she rests her head on my chest.

"But now he's the leader. I'm quite proud of him, actually."

She presses her hand against my chest and slowly lifts her head to look at me. She purses her lips but then just rests her head on my chest again.

"I…guess he has changed a lot," she mumbles.

"Hah, did I hear that right?" I tease.

"Oh shut up, I'm trying to be nice," she says.

"You are already nice," I say and place my hand on her head.

I'm not even seeing her face but I know for sure she is blushing like crazy. She rubs her cheek into my chest and breathes out slowly. This is nice, it truly is. I've never been a romantic guy or anything of the sort, but this feeling, this feeling is peaceful, pleasant and just absolutely blissful. Obviously, the occasional dirty thought crosses my mind. We are alone in a bedroom, after all. But I wouldn't trade this moment for anything in the world.

"Hey…I..uh I've been thinking," she mumbles.

She lifts her head up and slowly crawls her way up, closer to me, pleasantly close to me. She straddles me, her face close to mine. I can feel her breath lightly brushing close to my lips and nose.

"I wouldn't mind if you…I mean," she says and quickly clears her throat, "you know…"

"What are you suggesting?" I ask, playing coy.

"Meanie, don't make me say it," she purrs and presses her lips against mine.

Her hands gently cradle my head and my own find their way to her hips. The touch of her lips is sweet, gentle and soft all in one. I make myself more comfortable, sitting up a little, resting my back on the bed's headboard. I can feel her body close to mine, her warmth enveloping my body. I'm one lucky guy.

"Yoh, Lisbeth is here!" Al yells from the other side of the door.

Goddammit.

"Fuck…" Aeri moans as she pulls away from my face, "I'll be down there in a second!"

"You called Lisbeth?" I ask.

"I visited her a few days ago, asked her to make a sword for me," she explains.

Obviously annoyed she stands up and groans, complaining all too loudly. Swiping down and then going through options she equips some light armor and heads to the door. I groggily sit up and rub the back of my head, missing the warmth of her beside me. Off to another mundane day, I stand up and I walk towards the door, Aeri just getting out of the room. I come out stretching and feel a strong pat on my back.

"Hopefully you are not up to any funny business," Al says.

"I leave that stuff to you and Elina," I snap back quickly, "This isn't payback for that time I walked in, is it?"

"So, you WERE up to funny business," he remarks.

"Whatever," I huff and push his shoulder playfully, "What time is it anyways?

"Like past twelve, you two know how to sleep in," he laughs.

I walk along with Al over to the handrail and lean on it with him. Strangely alike we both set our forearms on the rail and look down below to the building's entrance. Almost like a bad sit com we both sigh at the same time. Lisbeth stands right next to the door, holding a sheathed sword. Even from up here and with the thing on its sheath I can see her excellent craftsmanship.

The sheathe is some fine black leather, the strap is well made and it shines slightly, that's just how clean and pretty it is. Excitedly Aeri comes into view and Lisbeth with a warm smile greets her. I can see Lisbeth's mouth move and Aeri talking back, seems like they are exchanging some kind of joke. Aeri slightly turns her head to look at me and Lisbeth's gaze also finds itself on me. They go back to each other and laugh loudly enough for me to hear. Girl talk, huh?

"Another peaceful day," Al comments.

I see him smile slightly after saying this and it makes me smile as well.

"Another peaceful day," I reply, "Anyone out right now?"

"Esra, Owl, Ruri and Twyla went down some floors to look for some materials."

We stare down the foyer a bit longer and then Al stops leaning with me.

"Well, let's at least get Aeri to show us her new toy," Al says and heads for the stairs.

I push myself off the railing and walk over to the stairs, Yu comes out of his room and raises his fist. I fist bump him quickly and start going down the spiral stairs. My drowsiness almost fades completely as I reach the last step into the foyer.

"Hey, show off the new blade," Al requests.

I get closer to Al, Aeri and Lisbeth, and it becomes clear something is amiss. Lisbeth looks like a disgusted cat, her hair almost seems to be standing and she points her finger harshly at me.

"You! It's you!" she says.

I point my own finger at myself and chuckle a little. She keeps pointing in my direction, and then she reaches for her hammer with her other hand. She now holds it with both of her hands and strikes a battle stance. Geez. What got into her?

"I knew, you guys definitely seemed off!" she says and backs away from Aeri and Al, "No question since you hang around with this thief!"

Huh?

I hear a sword slowly being unsheathed behind me and turn to see Yu taking out his sword. He laughs with an odd tone and puts his free hand to his forehead. Weirded out and confused as hell I take a step back and try to get closer to Al and Aeri.

"Shit, I thought of many ways this would go down, but never did I think it would go down like this…" Yu mutters.

He swipes his menu down and sends what I can only think is a drafted message. I stand quite confused, drawing weapons on a safe area is quite a weird thing to do by itself. But even so, we seem to have reached a really weird kind of impasse.

"Yoh…what the hell are you doing Yu?" Al asks.

"Daath! This is the other thief I told you about. I'll give you one chance to explain. What are you doing with a thief?!" Lisbeth growls.

"What?" I ask blindly, then it clicks, "no…no, you can't mean-"

"Yeah, this is the first guy I saw stealing from me," she says, "I'll ask again only because I respect you Daath. What are you doing with a thief?"

"You told me about her because you wanted to steal from her again?" I ask, speaking harshly at Yu.

"Look, nothing good will come out of me answering that question," he says, "Now, please, come with me."

"We are not going anywhere with you, mate," Al says calmly, sounding a tad bit smug.

Glancing back I see Lisbeth reach for the door, she pushes it open and goes outside quickly. Shortly after I hear her yelp and she is thrown inside the building. Four men all dressed in white come in after her. All of them wielding their weapons, with menacing smiles all over their ugly mugs. Lastly a familiar guy all dressed in black, hood and all comes in. He takes the hood off of his face and I can finally see him, it's the man we encountered in the woods when getting Lisbeth's stuff back.

"How's it going Yu?" he says. "I have to admit you called us earlier than expected. Here I thought you were one for theatricals and stuff like that, now this just feels rushed."

"Frankly Al, I don't think you have a choice," Yu huffs, "Now gather everyone up, we are going out for a walk."

"You do realize you can't do a thing to us while we are inside here, let alone in town," Aeri says.

"There are five more men waiting outside sweetheart," says Yu's friend, "so you either come willingly or we drag you all the way out of town."

"You fuckers are with Klaus aren't you?" Al asks.

I can almost hear him grind his teeth from where he is standing. I see him clench his fist and equips his sword. He is about to go feral at them but suddenly stops, maybe he realized even inside here he can't hurt them because of the safe area system. I notice he stares up into the foyer and just now notice why he suddenly stopped himself. Elina stands at the top floor staring down at us with unease.

"Guys, round everyone up!" Yu yells and his associates start getting a hold of us, one by one.

I struggle, but to no avail; I find myself restrained after just a few seconds. One of the white-clad guys pushes me to the ground and steps on my head to keep me there. With the little rotation I have I can see Aeri, her face also pressed to the ground. I want to get off the ground and kill these fuckers but it is not happening. I can't move and I find myself in a position in which doing so would just hurt everyone.

Elina's cries are heard from the floors above and Kayla's and Kato's struggles can be heard as well.

"I'll kill you, I'll fucking kill you!" Al yells.

"I don't think so," Yu says, "Come on Al, be a pal and play along. If you do no one has to get hurt."

"We'll be moving your sorry asses to the canyon not far away from Barrowdell," the thief says.

I see Yu's boots in front of me and I see him crouch close to me.

"I'm sorry about this man," Yu says and then ever so slightly turns to Al, "it wasn't supposed to go down like this."

"But it did, buddy. Now, let's get these guys to Klaus; he must already be losing his patience," says Yu's friend." says Yu's friend.

"You better shut the hell up Kiba," Yu says, "You got us in this mess to begin with."

"Fine, fine. Come on, guys, we're running late," Kiba hollers.

Forcefully two guys stand me up and with both of my feet on the ground I'm able to see how another guy pulls on Lisbeth's hair to put her on her feet.

"Leave her be," Al mutters.

"What?" Kiba snaps.

"Leave the blacksmith out of this," Al says again, "Klaus' beef is with us alone."

"You don't get to deci-"

"Kiba, leave the girl, she has nothing to do with this," Yu interrupts.

Just now the fact that Twyla is nowhere to be seen sinks into my mind. Was she working with them perhaps? I hope to god that's just my paranoia speaking. There's no way the others…would betray us like this. Right?

Kiba signals the guy holding Lisbeth and he quickly let's go of her. Stumbling forwards she stares at me, her eyes water a bit but she runs out before I can see any tears roll off her face. I exchange a quick look with Al, oddly enough he looks calm.

Calm might not be the right word.

He's given up.

* * *

One foot in front of the other, easy enough. I can even discard the constant pushing and prodding as minor annoyance. I'm not worried about being pushed around, I'm worried about the look on Al's face before we left the guild house. He can't break down, not right now. To my right I occasionally see Aeri before she is pulled back behind me. Al walks slowly in-front of me, his head staring down at the muddy dirt just outside of Barrowdell's streets.

"Al," I huff.

"Hey shut up!" the man behind me yells and pushes me harshly.

I see Al still pacing in-front of me, he didn't even look back.

"Al!" I yell.

The man behind me pushes me to the ground and starts kicking my head.

"I said shut up!"

"Leave him alone!" Al howls and tries to help me.

Kiba steps in between me an Al, he holds Elina with a hand on her back and the other on a knife pointing to her throat.

"Woah, calm down alright? We don't want anything happening to little pretty face over here, do we?"

Al eyes visibly shakes and his teeth flare just like a monster at Kiba.

"Now get back in line."

Al reluctantly turns around and walks away with the other men dressed in white.

"He did say, this little peach right here was your weakness," Kiba says and laughs shortly after.

"Get back on your feet, dumbass."

The man behind me pulls me up and with a face full of dirt I keep walking. This can't be happening…

A few minutes of walking and we reach the edge of the massive canyon on the east side of the city. The canyon itself is some kind of sub-dungeon, it's crawling with enemies and it has a few safe areas spread in between. I keep being pushed and pushed until I'm but a few feet away from the edge. I lean my body forwards a bit. I get a dangerously weird urge to stare down, but I try my best not to look at the possibly deadly fall.

As I turn around I'm both scared and completely shocked. I see Klaus, standing in-between Yu and Kiba. The bastard must've slipped through as they were herding us out here. I stand in the middle, to my right Al, to my left Aeri. Just past Klaus I can see Regi, Elina, Kato and Kayla, behind them six of Klaus' men.

"What have we here?" Klaus mocks.

I expect Al to snap back at him but he says nothing.

Say something man. Come on.

"Tsk…" Aeri utters.

"Uhhh, yes. I see this little bitch is as charming as usual," Klaus continues.

"What do you want?" Al mumbles, his words barely reaching my own ears.

"Well first off, all of your Col," says Kiba, "weapons as well."

Klaus throws a pissed off glance to his side, it would seem Kiba spoke out of line.

"Don't try anything rash, I know what's on the shared inventory and what you guys usually carry with yourselves," Yu comments.

"Screw you, we ain't giving you shi-"

Aeri is interrupted by the sound of drawing swords, both to us standing near the edge and the backs of our friends in-front of us. I can see Al's sight is fixated on Elina, after all, why wouldn't it be? Reluctantly he unequips his sword and throws it in front of him.

Come on buddy, don't tell me you've given up. I need you to push, I need you to fight, come on.

Everyone except me and Aeri do the same. Unwillingly still I grab my sword, still in its sheathe with both of my hands. I throw it a few feet in front of me and groan. Aeri huffs out air from her nose and drops her old sword just in-front of her. She is still hiding her new sword, she is planning something.

"Good, good, now transfer the Col over to Yu," Kiba orders while pointing at Al.

"Wait!" Kato yells. "What are you guys going to do after we give you our stuff?"

"That's up to me to decide," Klaus answers, "Now Alshep, the money!"

Al sluggishly goes through his menu and transfer the collective amount of Col in our shared inventory over to Yu alone. Just like that a little over five hundred thousand Col gone.

"I hope you're happy now." Al says softly.

Yu looks right at Al but seconds later drops his sight to the ground, unable to look the person that took him into our guild in the eye.

"Go on, now," Klaus says, "get your goodies, this is where I end my part of the deal."

Yu starts approaching us while his friend Kiba walks back over to Regi and everyone else. Kiba quickly collects all of the weapons on his side. Yu however, stops right in-front of me and looks back at Klaus. If I didn't know any better I would say he is feeling remorseful about all of this.

"What are you going to do with them?" Yu asks.

He then bends over and picks up my sword, he stores it in his inventory and skips Aeri to walk over to Al.

"You are actually going to help me with what I want to do, that or…you'll be joining them," Klaus explains, "Didn't your friend tell you?"

"What?" Yu questions.

Kiba slowly makes his way over to us and with a wicked smile and his sword drawn.

"We are going to kill them," Kiba says with a grin.

Yu is just done taking away Al's sword when he quickly turns his body around to look at both Klaus and Kiba.

"No, no, that wasn't part of the deal," Yu protests.

"Listen closely Yu," Klaus says, "You are either in, or we will kill you as well."

"Come on man, you barely know these people," Kiba says, and gets closer to us.

"Yeah…you barely know us, right?" Aeri huffs, her sentence charged with both rage and disappointment.

With clear sign of regret Yu looks at Al, Aeri and myself. I can see him swallow his own saliva and look me straight in the eye. He wants to say he is sorry but at the same time I see no intent of backing away from his friend's plan.

Kiba is about to bend over to take Aeri's sword by himself when Aeri swiftly kicks him in the face, sending him to the ground on his ass.

"Kill them!" Klaus screams.

Aeri equips her new sword quickly and kicks her old sword away from Kiba. Kiba just barely stands up again when she pushes him to the ground again with her body. Klaus goes for Al, thankfully he reacts quickly and raises his arm to block Klaus' sword with his bracers. Al takes a lot of damage but the bracers manage to decrease the amount of damage he is taking from Klaus' sword strikes. I turn my head just in time to see Yu swing at me, I quickly step to the side and trip him as he moves past me. Aeri reaches me when a suddenly flash of light catches my attention on the back, where Elina stood with everyone else.

"Kato!" Regi screams with warped voice, agony flooding all of his tone.

No, it can't be.

Elina cowers behind Kayla and Regi, she is not crying though, her expression makes me feel more dread than whenever I've seen her crying. She is scared out of her mind, if it weren't because Kayla is pushing her back with a hand on her chest I bet she would be unable to move. Regi stands in-front of the two girls with a starter sword, something he probably kept in his inventory all this time. The cursor over Regi's head is orange, he probably had to attack the guys surrounding them a couple of times.

One of Klaus's thugs swings for Regi but he effectively parries his attack, following up with a sword skill, Regi viciously counter attacks. I notice his barrage of attack just doesn't stop though. I feel the need to run towards him but another flash of light makes me freeze. Regi stands frozen staring at tiny crystals of light dissolving right in front of him. He has killed another player.

Aeri stares awestruck along with myself, oblivious to Kiba coming at her from behind with a skill. I push her away to the side, unintentionally making her fall on Yu's grasp. He holds her tightly from her arms near the edge of the canyon and I suddenly feel an odd sensation pierce through my chest. I look down and see a slick black blade piercing through my chest. It feels weird, like a feeling that shouldn't exist, enough to make me freeze just staring down at my chest as my own health begins to drop quickly.

"Daath!" Aeri cries.

I turn my head just to the side and see Klaus kicking Al off the canyon's edge.

"No!" I yell and reach for Kiba's collar.

I pull him in close and with my unarmed skill connect my fist to his face. Dropping quite a bit of his health. I pull my hand back and let go of him before punching him again, this time in the stomach. He stumbles back and falls on the ground. I pull his blade out of my chest and throw it away behind me. I see Yu, stepping back, still holding Aeri tightly so she doesn't move or do anything.

I quickly jump over Kiba and begin punching him savagely in the face. One punch after the other I get his health to the red area.

I'm not stopping.

I hear him beg me to stop but I pay no attention to his pleas. I keep punching him until without noticing my fist just goes through him and into the ground. His body shattering, right bellow me into tiny bits of digital data. I stand up and turn to look Yu. I start making my way to him when I freeze, my health points dropping to zero.

"What a bummer, Kiba proved to be quite the valuable asset," I hear, Klaus whispering in my ear.

He retrieves his sword from my body and I fall to my knees. Aeri screams loudly, tears running down her cheeks. I see her struggle, my vision interrupted by some static like filter. Yu takes another step back, sadly into the canyon, he loses his balance and falls backwards, pulling Aeri along with him.

Klaus steps right in front of me, smiling, like a wicked man.

"Goodbye," he says.

My sight now completely blurred I feel as my back hit the cold ground beneath me. My sight fades to black and I see that stupid red box of text I saw a million times during the beta. It holds three words that now fill me with despair and agony.

Everyone….Mako...I won't be coming back home.

I'm sorry.

**-You are dead-**

* * *

Crysina here.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

Further commentary will be avoided, I think this is a special chapter not necessarily in a happy way but, you don't want read any dumb rants today. I'll see you next week. (4k views hype! Didn't think I would hit that number this month. Thank you to everyone who genuinely enjoys or mis-clicks my story haha.)

**redkiller87:** Merely a coincidence. What a badass name for a tank though.

Please do leave anything in your mind in a little review, if any questions arise I can happily answer them via PM or in the next chapter. You know how this goes.

Thank you for reading and I'll see you soon!

Next Chapter: "Stop Breathing"


	31. Chapter 31 - Stop Breathing

**Chapter 31.- Stop Breathing**

**February/20****th****/2023**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Barrow's Canyon – Sub-dungeon**

**Alshep**

How am I still alive?

A beeping sound along with the corner of my HUD flashing red tells me I'm close to dying. Uncomfortably close to dying. I roll on my back and stare up at the fall, very long and straight into the ground. I'm really surprised I'm still alive. Slightly to the side I see two figures falling fast, it seems they will fall close to me. I reach for a potion and quickly drink it, I'm not kicking the bucket any time soon. I stand steadily and smash the little vial on the floor next to me.

Not far from me, the twin figures land hard on the ground. Of the two, Aeri is the first to complain and to stand, although Yu follows her soon after. Tears run wildly down her eyes, combined with a deep expression of both sorrow and hate on her face.

"Are you alright?" I ask.

"Daa-Daath…." she stammers.

"No…No he is not…" I mumble.

Yu sluggishly tries to get up from the ground but Aeri violently kicks him over on his back and harshly steps on his throat. Yu struggles to both breathe and talk but the more he tries to move the more weight Aeri puts over her foot. Aeri clenches her fist and I can see how she applies more pressure with her foot.

"You killed him!" Aeri yells, as she leans more over her foot, "It's all your fault!"

I feel my knees shaking for a second before they give in and I stumble backwards trying to regain my balance. Panicking I bring up my friends list and see Daath's name, but it's grayed out.

No, no, no, this cannot be happening.

A cacophony of roars snaps me from my reverie. Turning, I see three massive chimeras swiftly approaching. I tentatively, yet urgently, fumble my way backwards towards Aeri, the chimeras matching me step for step.

"Aeri, we have to go," I say.

"No, you hold them back," she replies with a sour tone.

Taking a quick look I see Aeri stabbing her new sword through Yu and into the ground. She crouches next to his face and forces a big potion in his mouth. The guy is now both pinned to the ground and taking damage painfully slow because of the potion that is trying to heal him while the sword damages him.

I raise my guard up and try to box my head in between my arms. Alright…alright, I can give this a shot. The chimera in the middle begins its charge towards me. When it is close enough I step forwards taking the initiative and uppercut the beast right in the muzzle. Stunning him a little I take the small window and throw a few hooks to its sides, hitting the goat head on its back in the process. The second chimera crosses over to my side and lunges at me, it pushes me to the ground and starts biting my right shoulder. With my left arm I start hitting its face for it to let me go. I hit him quickly and not with that much power, mostly because I'm panicking and I want the thing to get off of me. Trying to collect myself I little I swing my left arm as far back as I can and with all my strength and help of the skill pummel the lion part right on the side of its head. It whimpers loudly and gets off, finally giving me a chance to stand up.

"You bastard!" Aeri cries.

I try not to mind her torture and look forwards to the three beasts, one of them stands at half health, the one that pinned me to the ground is close to red and the last one still stands at full health. Not waiting this time for them to go at me I run to the one with the least health. I make a quick skip off the ground and skid the last few feet to the weak monster. I swing my body back and when I'm close enough swing it forwards, delivering a strong blow right between its eyes. One down.

I turn around and duck just as the strongest one jumps just slightly over me. I regain my posture just as the other chimera jumps at me, this time I catch it, grabbing him just from under the pits of its front legs. I turn my body and slam it against the ground behind me before jumping on top of it to keep hitting it with my fists. It takes about four other blows to the head and the beast disappears from under me.

Catching a bit of a breather I stand far away from Aeri, the last chimera stands between me and her but the animal is solely fixated on killing me. I take out a small red vial and drink it since I didn't heal since I got attacked. Just past the monster I can Aeri sitting over Yu's chest, she is savagely beating him with her fists. Yu's body just flinches and moves weakly under her. I feel an instinctive need to protect him from her, to keep her from this mindless sadism, but I force myself to ignore it.

"Come on you ugly bastard, let's get this over with," I say, talking to the beast.

We both start circling each other, it would almost seem this AI controlled monster is trying to outsmart me. For the first time surprisingly, the snake tail on the back of its body wakes up and it angrily hisses at me. I step forwards and so does the beast. It lunges at me but I dodge to the right, just as I do so the thing twists its body and the snake part of the fiend wraps around my torso, I lose my balance and fall to the ground, just to be brutally dragged around.

Shit.

The snake head quickly approaches my face but I punch its jaw just as it is getting close enough to bite, it backs off slightly and just shakes off my punch. I grab it just below the jaw and starts hitting it with my right fist. One hit after the other the snake's grip around me weakens until I'm set free. Using my hands to crawl back a bit I distance myself from the prancing chimera.

The beast finally notices I'm free and immediately assumes a crouching position, as it gets close to me. I feel like a gazelle waiting to be preyed on. But, I am one badass fucking gazelle. The chimera's health is below twenty percent now.

Come on just another hit.

I throw a few hooks, left, right, left. The damn thing dodges them all and then moves forwards to bite.

"Alright, get your fill!" I yell and shove my arm down its mouth.

The beast begins to gag but I take my shot and hit it a couple of times with my free hand, successfully killing it. Breathing heavily I wipe my arm off monster drool and walk over to Aeri. She stands up from Yu and takes her sword out of his stomach.

"I'm sorry…please…" Yu begs.

Aeri turns her face to me, her eyes red, her face marked with the tracks of tears. She breathes irregularly, almost sobbing but she is done crying for now.

"I'm…I'm going to kill him," she says with a soft but warped tone.

She stares at me, almost as if looking for approval. Motionless she stands before me, her sword on her left hand, her knees shaking slightly. I place my hand gently on her shoulder and slightly rub my thumb over it. She then nods and turns around, she takes a few steps towards Yu who is still lying on the ground begging for mercy. Aeri grabs her sword with both hands and raises it over her head.

"Al, Aeri come on please! Please!" he bellows.

Without uttering another word Aeri swings her sword downwards, the blade slashes through Yu's face and then stabs the ground behind it. I can see Yu's eyes open, wide with fear and panic. His body twitches slightly before bursting into crystals of light. Aeri's knees buckle slightly but she uses her sword to steady herself. She pulls her sword off the ground and sheathes it at her hip.

"We need to get to a safe area," she says dryly.

I simply nod and walk past her after placing my hand once again on her shoulder, she matches my pace and we start walking to a small area lit up by torches not far from us. Our feet and armor make some noise as we move. I want to say something, but nothing comes out of my mouth. Aeri walks but a few inches away from me, her head looking straight at the ground, her fists clenched tight. I try to reach for her shoulder yet again, maybe at the very least try to provide some kind of comfort. My arm is just close enough but I pull it away as it's about to make contact.

We reach the small safe area and she just stands still, she embraces herself, her arms crossed, head slightly tilt to the side. The sight tears through me but I'm not even done processing what happened. I sit on the ground and lean my back on a nearby rock, I bring up my friends list again and hover my finger just over Daath's name. It's grayed out and it no longer brings options when I select it. I feel a void in my stomach and uncomfortable knot in my throat.

It can't be, it just can't be.

I feel my eyes getting watery and my nose isn't helping either. I adjust my position and cover my face with my right hand. I breathe in deeply but a loud sniffle escapes me. In between my fingers I can see Aeri turn her head at the sudden noise, she looks at me thoroughly and then turns her head away, clearly in pain.

She slowly brings herself to the ground not far from me and sits as well. I see her back rise and go down as she breathes deeply, but seconds later she starts sobbing quietly.

"Aeri," I mumble.

She turns her face to me, tears run frantically down her face, her breathing interrupted by her own cries. She gasps for air as she tries not to cry but it is to no avail. She slowly crawls over to me and hugs me tightly burying her face next to mine. After doing so, she just starts crying louder and louder. I place my hand on her back and hold her tight as she cries. I start sobbing like a damn baby as well.

"They killed him…" she says and gasps for air, "those bastards killed him,"

"I know…" I whisper, trying hard for my voice not to break.

She squeezes me tight and I do the same. I hold her close, real close. In this cruel agonizing moment I find comfort in her embrace and I can only hope she does as well.

* * *

Crap.

I fell asleep. Why the fuck did I fall asleep?

I sit up a bit straighter and notice Aeri is still hugging me tightly, she isn't crying anymore, she seems to be sleeping. I can't blame her; I felt exhausted as well. The only thing that remains of her sorrow is her irregular breathing. I look around and past the safe area I can see the chimeras I killed a while ago, they probably just respawned.

"Aeri, wake up," I say softly.

She lifts her head and backs away from me, she stares at me for a while and then just stares at the ground as she moves her fingers over it.

"It really happened, huh?" she asks.

I look away slightly, I hold my hand close to my mouth and then just let it drop to my lap.

"Yeah," I answer.

She clutches at the dirt beneath her and then struggling with her own legs stands up. She extends her hand to me and leans her body forwards. She sniffles slightly but then wipes under her nose with her free hand.

"Come on, we have to go back," she says.

I take her hand and she helps me up quickly. I pat my pants down and she turns around to go past the safe area.

"Can you make it out without a weapon?" she asks.

"It shouldn't be that much of a problem," I answer.

"Ok."

She's hurting, that's for sure, and I am as well, but we have to get out of here. I start following closely when I notice the cursor over her head.

Orange.

Right, after all she did kill Yu, but I will never blame her, if anything I'll have her back on the matter. But she is a red player now. No going back from that, or at least I don't know if it's possible.

"Kato…I think they also killed Kato," she mumbles.

"I saw…" I reply.

She then draws her sword and seconds later it shines with a skill at the ready.

"Up ahead," she mutters.

A lonely chimera lies a few feet in front of us, it seems to be sleeping, not minding us one bit. Aeri stops and then looks at me, her stare lingers a bit, but then she just nods.

"You go in first, I'll switch in after," she says.

I go past her and run towards the enemy. When I'm just a few feet away it notices me and stands up rather fast. The thing barely gains footing and I jump towards it, I kick its face and then throw myself to its tail. As I fall on my back I grab the snake's head and beat it numb. I let go quickly and roll my body to stand up.

"Switch," I say.

Aeri moves forward and with three quick steps let's her skill take over, quickly getting her close to the enemy and impaling her sword right through its side. She pulls on her sword, taking it out of the monster's body swiftly and then steps on its head to jump over it. As she hops over the chimera she swings her sword at the snake and successfully cuts off the snake bit of the thing. The chimera twitches and complains in pain but I don't give it the comfort of recovering.

I get close to it and kick it two times before hitting it another four with my fists. Easy enough the beast dies and I stand idly looking at the result screen. I sigh and dismiss it. I turn to Aeri and suddenly feel inadequate.

"Hey, uh…did you make a party…I don't know, wi-"

"Elina is ok, her health is full," she says, "I don't know about everyone else, but she is in my party."

I scratch the back of my head, hoping I didn't come across as somewhat apathetic to her situation.

"I want to get back to the guild house," she says.

"Yeah…Sorry," I reply.

She looks at me again, she diverts her eyes quickly and sighs.

"Whatever…" she groans.

What the hell should I even say? I remain quite, as I follow her. Daath is dead, there's no way around it. And Aeri and him were pretty close, I dare say as close as Elina and I am. She is not only hurting because she lost a friend, she is hurting because she lost a lover.

With nothing to say, not even to brighten the mood I keep quiet and to myself. We don't encounter another chimera all the way until we exit the canyon. We take to the side and slowly make out way up towards Barrowdell. Completely silent we walk close to the edge of the canyon as we make our way up to where we were held up.

I start growing uneasy, I'm still unarmed and however useful my unarmed combat skill is, I'm no match for another player. At the same time I worry that someone else might have gotten killed by Klaus' gang. There's no way of knowing for sure, I shake my head quickly. Of course there is. I bring up my menu and check my friend list. Everyone else seems to be doing fine but I'm incredibly dodgy. Just to be sure I send a message to everyone, questioning where they are and if they are ok.

"They are alright, you don't have to be all jumpy," Aeri huffs.

"I know…but well I want to make sure," I say.

"This is all my fault…" she says.

"Aeri…come on, it isn't."

"It is!" she screams and turns to me, "If I hadn't asked for Lisbeth to come, they would still be alive…he would still be alive,"

I take a step back and then clench my fists, it's not fair that on top of everything else she is blaming herself over all of this.

"If it weren't because of Lisbeth, we would've never found out Yu was with the White Snakes," I say.

"Are you saying, it's ok that he died!?" she asks, "Sorry, I forgot finding out someone is a spy is worth two lives of our own!"

"I didn't mean it like that," I say.

"Then shut the fuck up! You stupid…you…," she starts crying again and interrupts herself with her own sobbing.

She turns away and starts running up the road. I follow suit and try my best to catch her, but she has always been the fastest in the group. I still run nevertheless, as fast as I can I run and I run. I make it to the small clearing near the edge, I see Aeri kneeling down in the floor. There's no one else to be seen, not behind the tress, not in the clearing.

I walk over to her but keep my distance less than few feet away from her. She probably needs her space and some time to herself, but I'll be dead before I leave her alone at a time like this. I hear her sob, way quieter than before, it almost sounds like she is holding back but I know for sure she doesn't want to cry anymore. I turn around quickly, being alerted by a sudden noise near the tree line.

I see a friendly face, Twyla rides Edelwiess. Slowly she comes out of the tree line and approaches me with utmost care. Edelwiess lies on his belly next to me, being as quiet as possible, as if the big lizard itself were being respectful about the situation. Twyla slides off her beast and stands next to me.

"Is it true?" she asks softly.

"Yeah."

"They… They were both good guys," she says, "Daath and Kato…I mean it."

I feel like a real asshole, Daath's death is all I can think about but yet we also lost another team mate. Not that Kato isn't in my thoughts as well, but Daath is taking huge precedence and I can't help but to feel guilty about that fact.

"We should get her home," I say, "Even if it's by force, we shouldn't be out here for much longer."

Twyla silently nods and climbs on her pet.

"Come on boy," she says softly and pats Edelwiess' neck.

The lizard stands up slowly and makes her way to Aeri, I walk alongside it and see that when it approaches Aeri it gently nuzzles her before licking her face.

"Dummy…stop it," Aeri softly cries.

"Aeri let's go home for now, please," Twyla suggests.

She extends her hand to Aeri, offering a ride on top of her pet. Aeri looks at Twyla but she then stares at the dirt again. She breathes in deeply and then out loudly. Aeri raises her arm and takes hold of Twyla's hand. Helping her a little Twyla pulls her up on her feet and then pulls her up on top of Edelwiess.

"You are coming right?" Twyla asks.

"I want to go elsewhere first," I answer, "You go on ahead."

She respectfully nods my way and then with a soft kick to her beast's side she gets going. I turn around and look at the setting sun in the far away mountains.

"Al!"

I turn around, I see Aeri sitting behind Twyla, she is twisting her body to look at me.

"Please be careful."

I nod and then they start heading away from the clearing and into the tree line. I breathe in deeply and after a few minutes of staring into nothing I make my way to Barrowdell's town gate. I make it there before I even have time to realize and almost trip over the two small steps that lead up to the town's gate. I manage to not fall on my face and access the gate's menu. With a bit of hesitation a select the first floor and then the game promptly warps me to the main plaza in Starting City.

"Where it all started…" I say to myself.

I make my way towards the one place I never thought I would return to, the Monument of Life, with my feet leaden and unwilling to walk. I walk through the darkened hall, sluggishly tracing my hand along the right wall. I feel like a lost little boy looking for something to give him hope, but even I know what lies at the end of this damned structure is all things but a beacon of hope.

The room is dimly lit, the torches stand too far apart to make the whole room light up and the fire itself isn't anywhere near strong. The sickening familiar stone lies at the end, quite a bit of it looks powered down. How many people have died? How many have been viciously murdered? How many got a fair chance? I shamble my way to the stone and go over to the left side where his name might be. That feeling of me being an asshole comes back briefly. Without little hassle I locate Kato's name, near the middle. It's crossed out with two red lines, I press my finger on it, knowing exactly what will happen.

**-Kato-**

**-Player Killed-**

**-4:45PM-**

**-February 20, 2023-**

I don't know what to say, not even if I should say anything, to me, to the air, to this room. I just have no idea. I'm sorry man, I'm sorry I dragged you into this. I rest my palm on the stone and then clench my fist.

"I should've left you back in this city…" I say to the air, "It was because of me that you tagged along in the end."

I hang to the left and reach everyone's name whose name starts with a D. Daath's name is practically the first, I hover my finger over it and sigh deeply before pressing my fingers against his crossed out name. I feel stupid for being here, but deep inside I want all of this to be a bad dream, the entirety of these almost five months to just be a fever nightmare. But…it is all too real.

**-Daath-**

**-Player Killed-**

**-4:46PM-**

**-February 20, 2023-**

Fuck.

Why? Why you of all people?

"It isn't fair…" I say, my voice breaking beyond reason, "It isn't fucking fair."

I fall to my knees and slam my closed fist against the fucking piece of tone right in-front of me. I scream loudly into nothing, I don't know if I hit the thing to feel better or just to vent, I have no idea what I'm doing right now. This fucking game…

I stand up and throw a punch at the monument itself. My fists glow faintly as I'm trying to literally attack what is clearly an immortal object in the game. My fist is stopped just but a half inch away from the stone as a small purple grid is quickly projected before my knuckles. The big purple words saying "Immortal Object" appear and I again drop to my knees.

An absurdly inappropriate tune in the background music kicks in and it just adds up to my already crushing sadness. A set of about three violins, all of them playing crushingly depressing notes in synch to create an even sadder atmosphere.

"What good is all that we've been through if I don't have your dumb advice anymore…" I groan, "We made a guild man…we managed to help people. Ruri, Esra, Regi…even Kato, we helped them didn't we? We did good right?…right?"

I want someone, something to answer back, where is my god-dammed closure. Where the hell was my departing speech with wise words to help me keep moving forward? Movies, anime and manga always set death to be such a noble thing, such a graceful thing. Death is anything but graceful and noble. Daath was killed like a fucking dog and here I sulk, like an idiot not knowing what to do, looking for answers where there are none.

"What the hell do I do now man?" I ask, "I'm not fit to be a leader! What the hell am I supposed to do with everyone!?"

Using the damn rock to help myself up I get on my feet and lean my forehead on it. I push myself off the thing and start walking towards the exit. I stop myself as I'm halfway out though. I clench both my fists and turn myself around quickly.

"I'll make it back, that I promise," I say.

I said the same thing to Charles. No matter how, I will, I will find a reason, I will find a way. I'll make it back, I'll try my hardest for everyone to make it back, I swear.

"I've let you down in the past, many times…I'm sure of it," I huff, "I won't this time, even without your guidance, I will find a way! I'll make it through…"

* * *

I don't know how long it took me to get back here, I sure as hell know I could've gotten back in less than a few minutes but I draw a huge blank from the time I went out of the Monument of Life to right now that I stand in-front of the Guild's House door. I push my body forwards and twist the handle, making my way in.

"Al…" Elina cries softly.

She walks over to me with teary eyes and hugs me as she starts to cry loudly. I place my hand on the back of her head and gently hold her close. I raise my head and see Esra, Owl, Twyla and Regi sitting at the ground level table. They turn their heads to me, they all look sad, there's no way around that.

"Where's Aeri?" I ask.

"Kayla is in her room with her," Ruri mutters.

I just nod and holding Elina close to me walk over to the table. I sit next to Owl, and Elina sits next to me. She clings to me, shaking and sobbing. I pull her chair close to me and let her lean on me and hug me all she wants.

"I…just can't believe it," Owl says.

"Me neither," I reply.

I turn to Regi, he is nervously shifting on his seat, he leans forward, then back, slightly to the right, slightly to the left.

"Regi, you alright?" I ask.

With wide open eyes he turns to me and then his arms shake a little.

"I don't know man…I don't know," he says.

Esra stands up and quickly makes her way to me.

"I would advise to lock in a different set of privacy settings for this building, master…" she mumbles.

"I…didn't know I could do that…" I answer.

"Me neither, until recently, to be honest I never thought we would make use of them," she says, "I would suggest to only allow guild members unless they are invited."

"Yeah that makes sense…" I huff.

I'm just starting to shift through tabs of options when I hear a door slamming hard on the second floor followed by storming footsteps that sound to be getting close.

"Aeri, dear, don't do anything rash," Kayla says.

I see Aeri quickly make her way to the stairs, Kayla following close behind her. My menu suddenly pops up with a notification.

**-Aeri has left your guild-**

What?

"Aeri what are you doing?" I say as I stand up, harshly pushing Elina aside by accident.

"I'm…I don't think it's alright for me to be here any longer."

Everything all of the sudden gets dead silent.

"No, you can't go. You have to stay," I plead.

"Al, I'm a red player now, you can't have me around," she says.

Tears cloud my eyes for some reason, this can't be happening not on top of everything else. Why is this happening?

"Don't leave," I whine.

"Al, please, I have to…"

She walks past me, I want to turn around and grab her shoulder. I want to scream at her, I want to be mad at her, I want her to stay.

"I'm coming with you," Regi says as he pushes his chair back.

I turn around and see Aeri stop as she is about to reach the door.

"Reg-"

"I'm not taking no for an answer," he interrupts her, "So I'm coming with, deal with it."

"Fine."

**-Reginald has left your guild-**

"I'm sorry about all of this, guys, but you'll be better around without us," Aeri says.

She brings up her menu and starts taking every single name out of her friends list.

"You are even going that far, huh?" I say, anger finally brewing up in the deepest part of me.

"I can't have you guys looking for me," she says.

Regi starts doing the same, but at the very least he looks more hesitant about it. They all get that done rather quickly, after that they stand rather awkwardly near the door.

"This is good bye," Aeri mutters.

She takes a good long look at me.

"I thought I said, I never wanted to see you cry again," she says.

While she says this I can see a couple of tears roll down her face. I blow air through my nose and try my best to give her my best parting smirk.

"I guess we both suck at keeping promises," I reply.

Sounding pained she chuckles and turns her back on me. Without saying another word she opens the door and both her and Regi disappear into the night just as they go through the door. Silence lingers afterwards, for about a full minute or two.

"What are we gonna do now?" Ruri asks.

I turn around as I take a look at what remains of my guild.

"We start again."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

Now this time you guys get one big ass AN cause I know you've missed them so much. SOOOOO this is the end of Arc 2 which I named "Guild". Some of you may remember I like to think of these Arcs as seasons if my story were to be some kind of anime thing haha. But that's just silly me being silly. Next's week chapter will be a drastic change to the story, this mainly being because of how this Arc ended and because the next few chapters take my story in a whole different direction. Arc 3 is titled "Remnants" and oh man am I excited to share it with you guys.

Moving unto talking about last chapter like a tend to do. WOW reception was heavy! To be honest I didn't know what to expect in term of reviews or anything like that but I'm glad I got what I got even if a handful of those comments, PMs and reviews were heavily painted with the word "fuck". Even some had a combo of the "fuck" and the word "you" followed by "man". In all honesty this just makes me feel like I'm doing something right with my story to the point I've gotten some of you so invested that you replied to the chapter like you did. And learning about medieval torture methods from a particular someone is quite educative haha. So the sum up, do I have to kill of characters to get a lot of reviews? Haha of course I kid, I appreciate everyone of you that takes the time to review my story. So thank you all, you guys are awesome!

In retrospect this AN doesn't feel as large as I thought it would be now that I find myself writing it. A BIG BIG THANK YOU to anyone who has reviewed, faved, followed, read my story! You guys keep me going! Thank you DonnaHufflepuff for staying with me for as long as you did! THANK YOU mangachiaki for sticking through a whole arc with me! A little something else. It was recently brought to my attention that the link I had to an imgur gallery with sketches of my characters is not working, god know for how long it hasn't. ANYWAYS! If you go to my profile you can find an easy two step instruction list thingy that will allow you to see some drawing of my character, which are now complete and even colored in! With that said, everyone go and get hyped for next Sunday cause...reasons!

Please leave a review with anything on your mind about the story, characters, or really anything you want to comment on. As always I will get back to you as soon as I can cause I love having interaction with you guys if you so seek it.

Thank you for reading and I'll see you soon!

This time I leave you with a different kind of teaser.

In the Next Chapter:

**August/13th/2023**

**Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Monster Arena**


	32. Chapter 32 - Galvanize

**Chapter 32.- Galvanize**

**August/13th/2023**

**Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Monster Arena**

**?**

I lean against the wall, staring intently at the closed gate to the arena as if my gaze can prevent it from opening. I remember that we're here to prepare and adjust my breast plate and my boots, making them slightly tighter. My partner leans against the opposite wall, fixing his brilliant red hair with a resigned expression.

"Getting worried?" I tease.

He looks at me with a confident grin and then places both of his hands behind his head, trying to appear as relaxed as possible. A good attempt at hiding the obvious, but I can see through his lies.

"Not at all."

"You're such a liar," I keep teasing.

"Shut up," he says, blushing.

I stretch a little before jumping right into basic cardio warm-ups, preparing myself for the inevitable battle.

"I'll admit, I'm really liking your new armor," he says, "It's just the right amount of…revealing."

I push my chest plate up with my arm, making the slight cleavage all that more visible.

"Do you now?"

He seems transfixed for a moment but then creates a nonchalant air about him, looking away as if he had nothing better to do. He scratches his nose and then crosses his arms again.

"You are still just a little boy," I joke.

"Shut up, you're not even a year older than me!"

I chuckle and take out my bastard sword. I examine it quickly. Durability is doing fine, could do with some more sharpness but it will have to suffice for this encounter. I rest the tip on the ground and gently lean over the pummel, resting part of my weight on my weapon. He takes out his weapon as well; it's a sleek spatha, a bit vanilla for me but clean and easy to use. A wankel shield rests in his other hand.

"I wonder how many fans are out there?" He taps a thoughtful finger against his lips.

"You're so full of yourself; we only recently got a fan base, and even then, very few people have reasons to cheer for red players," I say.

"Ah, you doubt my...our...charm!"

"Pfft, whatever," I answer.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" A loud voice booms from the arena.

I grin and straighten my back, laying a hand atop my sword's hilt. Across from me, he hits his sword over his shield and smirks cockily at the gate.

"Today we have our local favorites again!" After that a loud noise which I can only describe as a crowd cheers loudly.

"See, I told you," he says.

"Blaze and Cinder are gracing us with their very presence once again, and you know what that means!"

The crowd goes wild again, almost deafening even from the inside of the tunnel.

"Big monsters, two players!" the announcer says, "All odds against them!"

"Stay calm," Blaze says on an annoyingly familiar tone.

"Oh come on, again?" I complain, "That thing is cheesy as hell…"

"We've been doing it almost all the time, come on," he says, sounding giddy.

I sigh loudly and see as the gate slowly starts to rise quite a few feet away from us.

"Stay calm," I say.

"Stay strong," he says.

I sigh loudly yet again and grab my sword with both hands as the gate raises itself enough for us to get out the tunnel.

"Let it all ignite!" we both yell in unison.

I try to get over my own embarrassment and start running out the tunnel ahead of Blaze. I can hear his armor clank behind me as I'm the first one to step out into the arena. The sun blinds me slightly but I stand confidently as I take my steps into the sand of the deadly stage. I steadily raise my sword into the air, trying to make it look like I'm barely struggling with its weight.

"Our favorite red-haired beauty Cinder steps into the fray, people!" the announcer yells.

Compared to the lackluster, random cheers of the NPCs, the screams of actual people, even if there's less than a hundred of them, are exhilarating. Out of the tunnel comes my lovely companion as he bashes his sword against his shield and turns around from side to side, riling up our fans of course.

"Blaze, everyone!"

"Much obliged, much obliged," he chants as he gets closer to me.

"I swear I never expected girls to shriek in excitement at the sound of your name," I huff and playful punch his arm.

"It was just a matter of time," he replies with a smile.

"Let's get this started! The monsters come into play!" The announcer yells.

Another gate opposite from us opens up and from inside of the tunnel come out two rather small dragons, roughly three times my size. They are really nothing to be afraid of since there are bigger dragons in Aincrad.

"Easy peasy," Blaze mutters.

"Don't get cocky," I huff.

He nods subtly and we charge forwards, rejoicing in the complete unity of our battles as our synced-up steps echo alongside each other. None of the nerves of the tunnel remain; we know what we're getting into and we know exactly how to get out. One of the dragons begins to take notice of us; with a flutter of its wings it gracefully pounces in our direction. Blaze rolls to the side and I slide under, the sand rubbing loudly under my legs. The first dragon hurtles past us, missing us completely. I stand up barely keeping my momentum and catch up to Blaze who is still make a mad dash to the dragon that didn't attack us.

He gets close, close enough for the dragon to claw at him. He raises his shield, blocking the attack as sparks rain from the sides of his iron barrier. A claw as hard as steel tends to do that against a fine shield. His sword begins to glow, and he lowers his defense to finally strike the beast. His sword connects beautifully with the dumb thing and the attack makes it back away like a scared little puppy.

"Switch!" he yells.

Practically feeling how the game's system pulls me forward I charge up a sword skill and stand dead in-front of the whining dragon. I stand idly, waiting for it to attack me.

"She is going for the parry!" Someone in the crowd yells.

Of course I am.

I can't help but to smile as the crowd goes wild. The dragon finally lifts its front leg, he swings at me but I swing right at its massive appendage. My sword clashes with its claws, I stand my ground and over power the thing's blow. As the monster staggers I run forwards and jump on its back. I hold my sword to my side and twist my body to grab it with both hands. My sword shines again and I activate the whirlwind skill. I spin gracefully on the dragons back, effectively damaging its wings.

"Switch!" I command as I see the other dragon approaching Blaze from behind.

I jump off dragon number two and run towards the one that was about to surprise him. I ready a skill and as I get closer I let go to attack. The dragon reacts faster and quickly swipes at me, sending me to the ground and taking quite a bit of my health.

"It seems one of our fan favorites has taken a good hit! And what are the arena rules!?"

"No health items!" the crowd roars.

Oh yeah, I forgot, this is where you guys start acting like assholes.

I pick myself up and grab my sword as I stand up. I move my neck and it satisfyingly cracks as I do. I breathe out in relief and can finally concentrate on being pissed. I tighten the grip around my sword and feel the hilt vibrate right in my hand.

I dig into my pocket with my left hand and take out six throwing knifes. I love these small little bastards. I grab one between my index and ring finger and tighten the rest against my palm. Glancing to the side I see Blaze easily fending off the weaker dragon. I turn my sight to the problem at hand and throw a knife at the dragon's face. It bounces off like a cheap piece of plastic, its hard scales making a really annoying clank sound.

I'm trying to get the eye here…

It swipes again and this time I roll forwards, its leg brushing just over my head. I roll right into my back and throw another knife to its face. This one gets impaled just a few inches away from my target, the monster doesn't even flinch. With a knife protruding out of its head it just gets more pissed off and tries to stomp me right into the ground below him. I cover my face and roll to the side, sadly I'm not fast enough and it manages to hit me twice before I roll out to safety.

My health is red, bleeping and blinking. Maybe it's just that I need the rush of adrenaline then. I stand up and suddenly feel completely loose and flowing. Maybe I am a bit of junkie for these type of situations. I grin widely and grab my sword with just one hand. The dragon turns and not wasting a second swipes again. I jump and land on its leg, stabbing my sword through it and hanging on for dear life. As it's about to lower its leg, I remove my sword and leap towards its face. I manage to balance myself just over its muzzle and stab my sword right on its skull. I hang onto my sword with my right hand as it shakes violently. With a handful of blades in my free hand, I swing to the side and stab four knives into its large right eye.

The dragon roars in pain and fire finally bursts from its fang-bordered jaws. I jump out, leaving my sword impaled right through its thick skull. I roll as soon as I hit the ground and take a war hammer out of my inventory.

"Are you done playing around?" I ask loudly.

"In a second honey," Blaze says as he successfully parries another blow from the dragon he is trying to kill.

He is pushed back by his monster hitting his shield with its tail. Blaze's guard is really something to be admired, he is a god damned wall as of late. After receiving the blow he drops his shield to the ground and grabs his sword with both hands. It shines brightly and he steps forward, reaching the beast's belly. He drives his sword in right through the stomach and then pulling it upwards executes his skill. The dragon staggers back and shatters quickly after.

"Hey, watch out!" he screams as he turns around.

The dragon that remains stands about ten feet away from me, its mouth open, pointing right at me. I can see fire brewing up on the back of its throat before I'm pushed away by my partner. I fall on the ground and turn my body to see him block the blast of fire head on without a shield. I barely see his silhouette through the stream of fire, he is covering his face, trying to endure it. The dragon stops his attack to recover and jumps back to distance itself further from us.

Blaze's health dips a bit lower than mine, which worries me; both of us are in the red, where one hit could easily send us packing. I crawl over to him and stand up just as I'm close enough to grab his hand. I grab his hand and pull him along with me as we start to run towards the dragon.

"Come on, let's get creative," I say, "Get it to attack you with its leg."

"Oh right, let me just blatantly throw my life away."

"Trust me."

He nods reluctantly and runs ahead of me, allowing me to stay behind and ready a skill. I never used the thing before but at least I have the very basic skill on it ready to use. The dragon swipes at Blaze with its leg. This makes the dragon lean forward, lowering his head enough for my sword to be reached. I step in from his blind side, the bunch of daggers sticking out of its twitching eye.

Now to hit the nail.

I stop myself and quickly swing my arms, my hammer swinging with force through the air. I adjust myself a little and manage to hit the pummel of my sword dead on with my hammer. Like butter my sword slides in further into the dragon's skull. With an interrupted cry the dragon practically ragdolls to the floor and seconds later disappears.

"Cinder and Blaze ladies and gentlemen!"

The crowd goes crazy and roses rain down from the sky. I would be rather amazed if I didn't know already that these are generated from the arena itself and not from the players watching. Suddenly a pair of blue and white striped panties hits my face and dangle from head. I take it off my head and stare at it in disbelief.

"You have got to be kidding me…"

Blaze snatches it away from my hand and stares at it as if it were a very captivating piece of art.

"Fan girls are nuts," he says with a smile.

"You are not keeping that," I say.

"But…"

"You are not keeping that," I say again.

With a disappointed look on his face he drops the pair of underwear and grabs my sword from the ground. I put the hammer away and he tosses my sword at me. I catch it with one hand and sheathe it on my hip. I look at the upper left corner and sigh at our current health. We start making our way to the Arena's tunnel back to the prep area.

"We've never been this close," I mumble.

"We are alive, don't fret about it," he says and pulls me close with his arm.

I lean on him and sigh loudly again, trying to sound more like I'm complaining than anything else. He chuckles and ruffles my hair before letting go of me. As soon as we are past the gate's archway it slams violently to the ground, locking us inside the tunnel. We walk further inside to where it's a lit up by some torches and I sit on a bench placed along the wall. My partner sits next to me and sighs, resting his head on the wall.

"I still think my show name is rather dumb," he complains.

"You chose it on your own," I tease.

"Yeah yeah, I just, eh I don't know."

"It's not like Reginald sounds any cooler," I poke.

He pushes me playfully and I push him back.

"You are always poking fun at me," he says.

"Maybe I just like you," I purr, getting close to his face.

He leans forward and kisses me gently, he's never been a bashful guy after all. I lean in as well, parting my lips just slightly to return the gentle display of affection. Suddenly I hear our lips smack and our breathing grow ragged so I grow a bit self-conscious and back away. I clear my throat and I can see him chuckling.

"Shut up," I mumble.

"Didn't say a thing," he says, "Here, drink up."

He gives me a potion and gets one for himself. I pop the top off the vail and slowly drink all of its content. I wipe my mouth after I'm done and throw the vail at the wall. It disappears before crashing at the wall and I'm left unfulfilled.

"So this is…the forty eighth time?"

"Yup, forty eight battles," I huff, "Not nearly enough Col to make it worthwhile."

"I guess you could say that," he says.

"But… it's either this or to be hated by other people," I say.

"Kind of odd that all you need to do is risk your life, to stop being viewed as a plague."

"Being a red player isn't all that bad," I say and lean on Regi a bit.

"I could do without the stink-eye but I guess it isn't that bad once you actually try to clean your reputation," he answers.

"Dear god though when did we go so cheesy with these show names and stuff?" I say, changing the subject.

He chuckles and place his hand on top on my head.

"You tell me Cinder."

"Oh stop that, only when on the arena please," I beg.

"Alright alright, Aeri," he says putting unnecessary emphasis on the last bit.

"Let's go to a pub. I want to get really, really pretend drunk."

* * *

"So what's our financial status anyway?"

"We have enough to cover basic expenses if we don't go to another inn and we keep fighting at the arena." he explains.

We sit at the bar in a rather busy tavern, nothing too shabby but definitely a local hot spot. I trace my finger along the rim of my mug, sighing. It's not that I want to settle down and acclimate to a boring life in a boring house that we bought. Being a red player sort of limits you in a way, as far as interactions with other players go at least. Some towns we can't even go into and we are barred off from a lot of both NPC and Player run businesses. But…we make due.

As of late quite a lot of players have stopped adventuring and focused on safer things. Players now own inns, restaurants, shops, and many other things. Unlike an NPC a player can choose who to sell to and who not to sell to. Naturally all player run businesses are quite adamant about not helping out red players, therefore we have been locked out of most player shops just for having a dumb orange cursor over our heads. What makes this suck the most is that players produce better items, weapons and armor than regular NPCs. And the food, player made food is just the absolute best.

I grab my mug of ale and drink all of what's left inside. It's cold and nice, I set the mug down and ask the owner for another. He smiles and nods at me before filling another mug to the brim with ale. NPCs are so quirky with their expressions.

"Can we keep up our drinking expenses?" I ask.

"Our?"

"My drinking expenses?" I correct myself, "Oh like you are such a saint, shut up you eat and drink almost as much as I do!"

"Yeah I'm just kidding, we should do some more quests though," he says.

"Well yeah, but it's hard when every player thinks you are out to kill them and the other red ones just want to have a go at you," I whine.

"True," he says and takes a big gulp out of his mug.

"Excuse me."

I turn around quickly and spot a little boy, it strikes me really oddly. It's quite literally a little boy. If I had to guess I wouldn't say he is older than twelve. I realize my expression might not be the friendliest one and smile warmly. The NPC delivers my mug with ale but I ignore it for the time being.

"What is it?" I ask.

"Are…are you two Cinder and Blaze?" he asks excited, "The arena monster hunters?!"

"Yes, my dear friend!" Regi says and turns around, "What can I do for you?"

"Could I take a picture with you two?" the boy asks as he takes a small crystal out of his pocket

"Of course," I say, sounding way too excited.

Regi always joked about it but it appears we do have some fans. The boy turns his back on us and lifts the crystal in the air. I grab the boy from behind and pull him close, I hug him with my arm and do a little peace sign with my other hand. Regi leans in close to us and the boy takes the picture. I let go of him and excited he thanks us.

"Be sure to get a copy to me," I joke.

"And just what is scum like you two doing here?"

Bitterly I turn to the source of the voice. A guys sitting at a table with three others stares at us with a frown.

"Excuse me?" I hiss.

I feel Regi's hand on my shoulder, and he slightly pulls me back.

"You heard me," the guy says, "You two are red players, celebrities or not you guys are scum. What are you guys doing around all of us green players?"

"Back off buddy," Regi huffs.

"Or what?" the guy says as he stands up, "You are going to kill us?"

He opens his arms, making a huge scene, but I see past these little shit's delusions. He is trying to sound tough while he is public. Bad luck for him though, I never cared for a crowd.

Let's have some fun with this guy.

I chortle loudly and begin to laugh like a mad person as I hold my stomach, making it as exaggerated as possible. The guy starts getting pissed off, he is obviously not taking kindly to my reaction.

"What's so funny, huh?" he asks.

"But I only need to kill you," I say calmly and without a trace of laughter in my voice, "I'm itching to, actually."

Everyone in the tavern shuts up and all eyes are fixated on me and tough guy over here. I get up from the stool and erratically walk over to the guy. Partially because of all the ale and the game systems and partially cause I want to look bizarre.

"You wouldn't…" he says, his voice changing into a cowardly tone.

"Oh I would," I say slowly and take a throwing knife out of my pocket.

I grab they guy's collar and pull him close to me, I raise the knife and ever so slightly place it uncomfortable close to his neck. Not enough for the system to detect an attack or violation but close enough for it to feel threatening.

"What's your name dear?" I ask.

"Fran..." he mutters.

"Speak up!" I yell.

"F-Fran!"

I let go of his collar and place my finger index finger on his chin.

"Fran, why would it cross your mind that it is a good idea to piss me off?" I ask delicately.

I trace my finger to his cheek and then back to his chin this time pushing under it to tilt his head upwards.

"I…I'm sorry I'm sorry!"

"Will you say hurtful things to me and my partner again?" I ask, making a cute pouty face as I do.

"No no, I'm sorry! Please forgive me," he whimpers.

"Attaboy," I sing and put the knife away.

With his knees shaking he sits back down at his table and I slowly make my way to the door of the tavern. I push it open with my weight and sit on a bench that is just outside of the establishment. Seconds later, Regi comes out the door, I can hear the chatter coming from inside the tavern but it is slowly drowned out as the door itself closes behind him. He stands next to me and he breathes in and out loudly. Then he starts laughing.

"F-Fran!" he says mockingly.

I start laughing as well and stand up.

"You know how to make a dull night entertaining," he says.

"I do, don't I?" I say and chuckle some more, "What an idiot though, I can't do anything to him on a safe zone."

He chuckles some more and then helps me off the bench.

"Let's go back to the inn, I could really do with some sleep," he says.

"You say that, and then we don't end up sleeping at all," I tease.

He blushes slightly and scratches his nose.

"Well you can't say it's entirely my fault," he replies.

I link my arm to his and lean my head on his shoulder.

"I never said it was."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

**EDIT ****:** **1****2/07/2015 8:00 PM .-** This chapter is now implemented with mangachiaki's revisions, so a big thank you to her! (It would seem I was just too eager to post this chapter haha.)

AND WE ARE BACK LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! Aeri and Regi are living the high life and even got matching hair colors now. Customization items is something I really want to play around with in the future but meh...we'll see. My story takes a wild number of twists and turns from now own. Mainly cause from now on I take a bigger amount of liberties with Aincrad's universe. For example this monster arena. Not much is known about it, it's just there, so I took it upon myself for it to have a player announcer and people and NPCs watching what happens inside of it. And you'll see what I'm talking about later on when I speak about these liberties I will be taking. Personally I think my decision are to further improve my story and to hopefully keep you interested as I have so far!

Now let's talk about last chapters feedback. I LOVE YOU GUYS! All those reviews and nice things, and the death threats (this one was explained to be a joke btw). I will definitely not be the next R.R. Martin or I don't know, maybe I will. MUAHAHA. I'm sure this chapter will at least set some feelings to rest, no more tragedy and despair shall befall our characters for this chapter at least. I know you totally want to know there is progress on some new sketches but I'm not quite sure when I'll be sharing them so if you are at all interested in that, I will be sure to let you know later. As I post this I'm twelve views shy of hitting 5k! SUPER EXCITED! That's it for today!

I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Red Savior"


	33. Chapter 33 - Red Savior

**Chapter 33.- Red Savior**

**August/19th/2023**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Imp Caves **

**Reginald**

I sheathe my sword after killing another set of three imps. The things are easy enemies, nothing to get too excited about. They are weak as hell and can usually be taken out in a hit or two. The things I do for materials. There's a one out a hundred chance that these little idiots will drop rare material I want to be able to upgrade my shield. It's boring for sure, boring enough that not even the lovely Aeri cared to accompany me. I bring up my menu and look at the stack of refined imp stone I've been gathering.

"Just two more," I say to myself.

I continue walking through the tight corridors, occasionally feeling slight jolts of discomfort at the cramped quarters. It's nothing that bothers me greatly, but it might just be too cramped. I suppose alone time can be nice occasionally; more time to think, to reminisce. I can see a group of about five imps spawn in-front of me.

"Time to kill," I say smugly.

I attach my shield to my back and holding my sword with both hands I jump over the little monsters. You should never let size fool, these little vermin can be quite deadly if approached without caution, but my level makes me confident enough to not give a damn. I turn around and with a long swipe I kill two of the things. I turn on my right foot and with three regular attacks take out another. One of the two remaining jumps at me; I grab it with my left hand and with a pierce skill kill the other to my right. The little creature struggles to break free of my left hand. I chuckle slightly. I throw it up just like a baseball and hold my sword like a bat. As it comes down I swing at it with the blunt side of my sword. The attack combined with the poor thing slamming against the nearby wall kills it.

The result screen pops up and I feel immensely lucky. The stone dropped twice and there is no longer any need for me to be here. I sheathe my sword and dust off my hands.

"All in a day's work."

Most of the time I'm happy there's no one around to hear me talk to myself but at the same time I think some people miss out on really cool one-liners and phrases. Now to the lovely gamer's sin that is back-tracking. Truth be told, I'm only doing so because the end of the cave is farther than the entrance, taking into considerations how far in I stand it's easier to just head back.

"When the wind rings high," I sing, "and the light hits your eyes."

I continue to hum along as I walk, feeling jazzy I walk with all the amazing style I can muster through the cave. Reaching the light at the end of the corridor I speed up and jump out into the beautiful, mountain crowded sight that is the twenty seventh floor of this tower. I twirl around on my left foot, still feeling musical and keep singing.

"Lift my head and turn around, you are nowhere to be found!" I sing, and then I throw my arms to the sky and smile, "Just big blue sky, and my teardrops on the ground."

I don't have the best of voices, but then again no one is around to complain. I start heading down the slope that leads to the cave's entrance and lash out a killer drum solo in the back on my mind. I should go out on my own more often. I beeping sound takes me out of my groove and I display my menu as I keep walking towards the nearby trees.

-From: Aeri  
-To: Reginald  
-Subject: Morning  
-Message: Where are you? I want to go eat breakfast and I don't like eating alone.

Never early to rise, this girl should get healthier habits other than sleeping in, eating and drinking. I mean damn, it's almost two in the afternoon.

-From: Reginald  
-To: Aeri  
-Subject: Re: Morning  
-Message: Finally done, got all my materials, be back soon.

I send the message and walk through the shabby woods. There are just a few trees and they aren't even twice my size, mostly annoying bushes and random flowers populate the flora of this floor. I grab a map out of my pouch and spread it in-front of me. Better put it to good use, I paid quite a bit of Col for it.

"What was it…Lobrun..Ro…Ronbaru!" I say and brush my finger over the floor's main settlement that is neatly pictured in the map.

I swerve slightly to the left and push the map back on my pouch. It's just a bit past morning and the day seems to be settling down to coming back to Aeri, eating, drinking and probably sleeping a whole lot. Not something I dislike, but it sure as hell sounds a bit dull. I stretch my arms out and yawn.

"Damn," I scoff, "Being around her is rubbing off."

"You two get back here!"

Taken by surprise I jump behind a tree, its trunk not even being nearly big enough to hide myself. Well this is unfortunate. Some random force pushes me to the ground and I find myself with my back on the ground and a gorgeous little lady groaning on top of me. She lifts her face off my chest, gorgeous light brown eyes, and thin smooth lips. Captivating to say the least, not to mention her cute white short hair.

"Hello, there…" I mumble.

"I'm sorry…wait I'm not! Get off of me!" she yells and tussles on top of me.

She leaps off of me and I stand up quickly. I turn to her and dust off my pants.

"You are rude little lad-" I manage to say before I'm pushed to the ground again.

Falling on my face I groan loudly as I feel a warm sensation all over my back. With a cute sounding groan I can only guess another girl has toppled me over.

"Sinna, get away from that guy!" the first girl demands.

"Meira! They are coming!" the second girl shouts.

"Hey, what's the deal here?" I ask as I stand up.

"Get away from us! You are a red player too," says girl number one.

"I uh…yes, bu-"

"There they are!" says a deep voice.

I turn around and see two dudes on bulky armor. One carries a longsword and the other a massive hammer. I glance back quickly and take a good look at the girls. The first thing to hit me is that one of the girls is definitely way younger than me. The girl with white short hair is probably around my age, but the second girl, Sinna I believe, looks so little. She is way too young; I begin to wonder what she is even doing in this game.

"Hey, mister please help us!" the small girl pleads says.

"Sinna, shut up…"

I lift my arms, in intent to calm down the two guys in front of me. I chuckle nervously and clear my throat as they get within weapon range of me.

"What seems to be the problem?" I ask, shielding the girls behind me with my body.

"We ain't got beef with you, now move!" says the guy with the hammer.

"Come on now, we are all gentlemen, we can sort this out," I suggest.

"We are not working anything out now move!" says the other guy and swings his sword at me.

I take a step back and instinctively kick his wrist, sending his sword clattering to the ground. Feeling cool as hell I smirk at the dude and lower my hands, reaching for some knives in my pockets. Dude number two swings his hammer at me and I dodge to the side, as I do so I stab the knife through his chest and throw another at the guy with the sword. They freeze into place just like I was expecting and I look back at the girls.

They stare in awe at me. Ladies please, I know I'm cool, but we need to get out of here. I walk over to the girls and beckon them to come along as I walk past them.

"Come on, it's not the best paralyze poison I've made, we have a few seconds," I explain.

The girl I assume to be Sinna follows me quickly and the other hesitates a few seconds, but after seeing her friend follow me, she quickly catches up to us. I try to set ourselves to go back to the caves, if these guys are serious they will follow us there, and right there it's the best place to lose them.

I see the cave's entrance and using my hands to balance myself I make it up the slope. Sinna clambers quickly after me and I see the other girl, hesitate to go up.

"Meira! Meira, right?" I ask.

The girl nods at me with a frown and looks around nervously.

"Come on, we can hide here," I say.

"Come on, Meira!" Sinna yells.

With a bit of a vantage point and through the scarce woods I see the two dudes in armor closing in on us. I step forwards and slide down the slope, leaving Sinna close to the cave's entrance. I reach Meira and grab her arm, I pull her up with me and feel as she is trying to drag me back.

"Wait wait!" she stammers.

"Hey you! Stop!" one of the men yells.

Not wasting another second I grab the girl and struggling carry her in my arms up the cave's entrance.

"Go go go!" I say as I make it past Sinna.

We rush into the imp caves and make it to the first part of the caves that split into two ways. I take a right and keep running as fast as I can. Meira clings harshly to me, her nails digging into my skin through my back. Our steps echo loudly through the narrow path of the cave. Hoping I chose the right way I keep hauling ass until I finally reach a big drop in the caves. A big circular hole just in the middle of the floor.

"What now?" Sinna asks.

"Down through there," I say.

I set the other girl on her feet and her knees shake wildly. She starts breathing erratically as she takes in her surroundings. Sinna stares at me in disbelief and I find myself with no other choice than to explain and lose more time.

"There's water below, now jump."

"I can't swim!" Meira cries.

"She's also afraid of heights," Sinna adds, "and claustrophobic, too."

"Sh-shut up!" Meira says.

"We'll find you!" echoes from behind us.

Panicked by the shout form our pursuers Sinna jumps into the hole and I hear her screams as she falls down. Seconds later a splash follows. I take a look at Meira and she is shaking beyond reason, even struggle to get air inside her.

"Come on, we have to jump," I say.

"I..I know, shut up!"

Hearing the echoes of steps behind us I start growing anxious. Knowing I will regret it later I place my hand on the girl's back and push her into the dark hole. I hear her scream on her way down and then turn to the nearby torch. I take out my sword and slash at it, cutting it in half and extinguishing as it hits the ground.

I turn my back on the hole and see the two heavy armored guys coming down the narrow stretch. I can see them clearly but I'm pretty sure they can't see me. I step back and spread my arms open as I fall down the hole. Going through the water head first I suddenly feel refreshed. I twist my body around and start swimming up. I surface and gasp for air, there's a small area lit up by torches, where I can see Sinna standing up, looking worriedly into the underground pond.

I go underwater again and with the little light that manages to pierce the water I see a sinking hand trying to reach for the surface. I tread water to go down and desperately try to reach for Meira's hand as it finishes sinking into the dark depth. I keep going down and I can no longer see anything other than darkness. I stretch my arm out and with my hand try to hold whatever might be in-front of me. I make contact with her fingers and grasping them hard I pull on her hand to be able to grasp her wrist.

I swim up as fast as I can, being only slightly slowed down by the girl. We break water tension and both of us inhale loudly as we finally make it out. Meira coughs violently and I pull her close to me as I make my way to the edge where Sinna is looking at us with sparkling eyes. Meira climbs quickly over to where Sinna is standing; Meira rolls on her back not even bothering to stand up starts heaving. I stay close, hanging on from the edge but my body still in the water.

"That was close, huh?" I joke.

"Damn you…" Meira huffs.

"Thank you so much mister," Sinna says wholeheartedly.

"Regi, call me Regi," I say and slowly get out of the water.

I sit on the edge, with my feet still in the water and sigh. Meira slowly sits up and looks around, this area is a whole lot bigger. Much like a really big room this sets itself aside from narrow corridors of the cave entrance above. I look over to Sinna, she is definitely twelve years old tops, she looks even younger and more naive than I certain little girl I've met in the past. Long brown hair tied up on a side pony tail, just looking at her face is a dead giveaway that she is still a kid, round little nose, her cheeks still sort of chubby.

"Why are those guys after you?" I ask.

"They are scary men!" Sinna exclaims, "They wanted us to follow them and help them in really weird stuff! So we ran away and they started following us and then we found you mist-Regi!"

"It's n-not like we needed your help or anything," Meira murmurs.

"You helped us a lot!" Sinna says excited.

"Y-yeah…thank you," Meira says almost whispering.

"How old are you two?" I ask absentmindedly.

"I'm eleven!" Sinna says raising her hand.

Damn, I can't believe she probably spent her eleventh birthday trapped in this game. That bastard game master truly didn't care who he got trapped in this thing.

"Sinna, don't just say how old you are to people!" Meira says, "It could be dangerous."

Meira stares at me fiercely, her clothes drenched and her skin glistening thanks to the nearby torches. I might be staring. She suddenly covers her chest with her hands and stares me down with a meaner look. I'm definitely staring.

"Anyways…" I say after a loud cough.

I get on my feet and awkwardly shake my legs to try and dry them up a bit. Sinna tightly runs her closed hands through her pony tail, squeezing water out of her hair. Meira goes through her menu and changes dry clothes, not exactly armor but at the very least fresh clothing.

"Why did you help us?" Meira questions, "I mean well….I'm just wondering."

"You would've helped me too, no?" I reply.

I turn my back and look around, I know there's an exit to the other side of the mountain but I can't remember that well. Both girls still remain silent after my reply. I hang my head and turn around feeling dumb.

"You wouldn't, huh?"

Meira just looks at the ground, not giving me a real answer.

"I would think about it real hard!" Sinna energetically replies.

"Sinna!" Meira scolds, "It's not like you can blame us, you know, with that cursor over your head."

"You two seem to be very close," I say, discarding the subject at hand.

"We are sisters!" says Sinna.

"Sinna!" Meira scolds yet again.

"Fine, I'll say this plain and simple," I huff, "I'm not going to hurt you, I would like to get the hell out of here and if you want to come along, I don't mind. But you should be a little more trusting."

I see Sinna getting ready to cheerfully open her mouth again but Meira quickly turns around to cover her mouth. She grabs her sister's arm and turns her around to talk to her. Meira murmurs and whispers to her sister and I only catch but snippets of their conversation.

"He looks nice though…" Sinna whines.

"Yeah but he is a red player Sinna, I don't know if we can trust him."

"Come on, come on, he helped us so far," Sinna advocates.

Meira turns her head around quickly and looks at me for a few seconds. I open my arms and shrug at her as I'm still standing around in this humid cave.

"Fine, but don't get too friendly with him," Meira mutters.

"Yay!" Sinna yells and runs towards me.

She jumps off her feet and with her arms open she hangs from my neck. With no other choice but the catch her I fumble my body backwards and hold her as she laughs. Meira slowly sighs and presses her palm against her forehead.

"Mister, mister, give me a piggy back ride," Sinna begs.

"Ok, geez," I say and then laugh a little, "Settle down a bit though."

She lets go off me for a brief second and then goes around me. Barely giving me time to crouch she is already jumping on my back. I place my hands under her legs and she places both of her hands on my shoulders.

"All set?" I ask.

"Yes!" she sings.

"Where do we go then?" Meira asks as she sets herself next to me.

"Deeper into the cave for a few minutes, then we should be out in the open," I say and wearily look at the small tunnel, "You think you'll be alright?"

"Wo…worry about yourself, alright?"

I chuckle slightly and start walking ahead. Silently I approach the tunnel, it's tall enough for me to walk easily with Sinna on my back but it does look rather narrow. I stop just at the beginning of it and turn around, Meira sticking closely behind me, I didn't notice any sooner but she is clutching at my coat.

"It's alright, come on," I try to say reassuringly.

"Y-yeah I know! Sh-shut up!"

I try not to mind the girl so much, I shuffle my way into the tight passage and can hear her little steps slowly sounding off behind me. Suddenly Sinna's hand leave my shoulders and I feel how she starts playing with my hair.

"Why red hair?" she asks.

"It looks cool, I think," I respond.

"Like fire," she says gleefully.

"Like fire," I repeat.

"Hey…hey so…" Meira mumbles, her tone pressured, "So, uh, tell us about you or something,"

"Talk to sis so she doesn't get nervous," Sinna whispers in my ear.

"Well, my name is Reginald," I say and squeeze through a little tight part in the tunnel, "I'm an arena monster hunter; I was up here looking for materials until I bumped into you two."

I stop a few steps forwards and turn to see Meira, breathing heavily, her hands shaking as she traces them on the walls. I lean back a little and stretch my arm a little.

"Give me your hand," I say.

Hesitating she moves her hand close to mine but then backs away.

"Oh come on, I want to get out of here today," I complain.

She then slowly places her hand on top of my palm and holding it gently I pull her slightly to get her to move. It almost feels like she is pulling back but the poor big sister is just struggling with herself as I pull her along with me.

"How did you get the orange thingy?" Sinna asks suddenly.

"You mean the cursor? I don't think I should say."

"I'm curious too…kind of..." Meira seconds, sounding like she is running out of breath.

I look ahead and manage to see faint sunlight, we are almost there. I swallow my own spit and clear my throat.

"I…killed three players," I mumble.

Meira's grip on my hand suddenly loosens up but she doesn't let go. I also loosen my grip somewhat, I don't want her to feel like I'm holding her in place.

"Why?" Sinna ponders with an innocent tone on her voice.

"Because they were hurting my friends," I answer in a heartbeat.

"So, you are a good guy?" Sinna questions.

"I like to think so," I say.

"Your friends, are they ok?" Meira asks.

"Not all of them," I reply bluntly and step out of the cave, back to the open air on floor twenty seven.

Looking over in the distance I can see Ronbaru, the settlement sits on the side of a mountain. The whole town is literally carved into the mountain. Probably my favorite settlement so far, it has a nice design and it has this…."sheltered" feeling to it. Meira steps out of the cave and she breathes in deeply. She lets all the air out of her lungs slowly and pats her cheeks with her palms.

"I'm sorry about, misjudging you…I think," Meira says.

"It's alright, I would be very cautious with a red player too," I say, trying to reassure her.

I slowly crouch down and let Sinna get off my back on her own. She hops off quickly and gets next to her sister.

"Will you two be alright?" I ask, "I have a friend that is waiting for me to go eat something, if you two want may-"

"No thank you, I think we should be off on our now," Meira interjects.

"Suit yourselves," I say a bit irritated.

"No Regi, wait!" Sinna says.

"Yeah?"

"Can we go with you?" she asks.

"Sinna!" Meira scoffs.

"Just follow me, I know this place with awesome food," I say.

I take my first step down the mountain when I hear what sounds like a damage effect going off followed by Sinna screaming loudly. I jerk my body around and see Meira clutching at her neck, a long blade sticking right through it. She looks straight ahead with wide eyes and a scared expression all over her face. She drops to her knees and not even a second later her body burst into tiny shards of light. Finally focusing behind her I see the two men that were following us. I draw my shield and sword, the sword already whirring with a skill as I take it out.

The two men take a step back at my sudden move but the one with the hammer moves forward trying to get to Sinna. I step in quickly and with my sword slap his arm away as he is reaching out for the girl's arm. I lean my weight on my shield and hit him head on with it, toppling him to the ground.

"You should mind your own business!" says the other man as he swings his sword.

With a skill I parry his sword, overpowering his swing. I drop my shield and stab the man with a poisoned knife. Right after digging the small blade into his neck I kick him away and turn around to stab the other man right through the chest. He freezes mid-swing of his hammer. When my back was to him he was getting ready to attack but he was too slow. I take my sword out and then swing at his head. I close my eyes, I'm not sure why but after I'm done with the swing of my sword I open my eyes to see shards of light floating right in front of me.

I see Sinna just to the side, crouching on the ground covering her head with her hands and crying softly.

"You bastard!"

I'm tackled to the ground by the man that I poisoned, I briefly see his health standing at the yellow level just as he falls on top of me. It should still be going down, my paralysis poison isn't very good but real poison…I make an excellent one. He sits up slightly and grabs his sword ready to stab his blade right through me and into the ground. But I quickly take out a paralysis knife out of my pocket and simply poke the man's leg with it. He freezes on the spot, his sword over his head.

"What…are you doing?" he struggles to say.

His health reaches the critical level, my poison still slowly eating at his health points. I say nothing, I remain completely silent as I'm pinned down by the man, slowly watching him die. The man starts shaking and struggling as hard as he is able to once his health is close to being depleted. It won't do him any good though. His health bar drains completely and the weight over me suddenly disappears, along with his presence. I sit up slowly and press my right palm against my forehead. That's five…five people I've killed…I feel like vomiting, just like last time. This time the feeling only lingers for a few seconds though. From coward to killer…I have ways to surprise myself.

I turn my body around, still staying close to the ground and see Sinna. The poor girl still sobs quietly as she is curled up in a ball. I approach her slowly and place my hand over her head.

"Sinna…you ok?"

She yelps a little and backs away using her hands to drag herself back. I get a bit closer at the same time she backs away.

"Hey….we have to go somewhere else it's not safe here," I insist.

"Meira, where is Meira?" she asks.

I look back a bit looking at the spot where her older sister was standing just a few minutes ago. I turn back to the small girl, my mouth dry, doubting myself if I can say the right thing.

"She is gone Sinna…" I mutter. "I was too slow, I'm sorry."

"You took care of the scary men…" she says, her eyes now looking at me.

Drops of water fall on my face and then it starts raining quite strongly. Perfect, just perfect... Through the falling rain I see the little girl's face and I can no longer see any trace of the glee and happiness she was showing just minutes ago.

"I took care of them…yeah," I answer.

Even with the rain I can distinctly see tears rolling down her cheeks. I reach forwards and with my thumb wipe them away. She doesn't back away nor seems to be scared by my action. I stand up and look around, Ronbaru slightly being lit up in the distance. Looking back down Sinna is still crouching, staring into nothing.

"Sinna, please come with me," I ask, "Me and my friend…maybe you can stay with us,"

I only see her nod, but she doesn't even nod in my direction. I pick up my shield and lock it in my back.

"Can you walk?"

She shakes her head, still not even doing so in my direction. I get close and pick her up. She promptly turns her body around and wraps her arms around my neck and her legs around my back. She tucks her head in next to mine and I hear her silent sobs right next to my ear.

"We'll get some good food," I say and start making my way down, "Get you a bath and then go to bed, a nice warm bed."

I feel her nod her head close to mine and I breathe out a little, feeling relieved to be honest. Holding her close to me with my left hand I bring up my menu and send Aeri a quick message, stating that I'm coming back.

* * *

**Twenty Third Floor of Aincrad – Onyx &amp; Wolf – Player Run Inn**

"What was rule number one?" Aeri quietly badgers me.

"Are you kidding me right now? To hell with your rules." I reply.

She backs away probably surprised by my reply. She crosses her arms and look over to Sinna who is sitting next to me looking down at the table with her hand resting on it. I already explained to Aeri what happened but even then she seems dodgy about this.

"What happened the last time we trusted strangers?" she says rather calmly.

I know where she is going with this but I'm surprised at how calmly she is talking about it. I scratch the back of my head and take a deep breath before answering.

"I know, but come one…I mean I'm was also a stranger."

"You were but, you turned out not to be shitty," she says, "We don't take new people in, just like Daath did at first."

I slam the table with both of my fists.

"Daath is not around anymore! I hope you are listening to the stuff coming out of your mouth, you hypocrite!" I miff, "He took you in!"

Aeri's eyebrows dip and she flares her teeth at me. She is about to say something but stops herself. In a fit of anger she crosses her arms and refuses to look me in the eye. My comment was perhaps out of place but I'm fed up with how often she brings Daath up. I collect myself and breathe in deeply.

"Come on…she is just a little girl," I say.

Aeri looks over at Sinna again as if the poor girl were some kind of life threatening being. Even through that cold stare of hers I can see that she believes me and my story. Aeri has a soft spot and once you get there she is the nicest person in the world but it baffles me how doubtful and careful she is being about this.

"Lady," Sinna exclaims.

"What is it?" Aeri snaps back.

"I like your hair a lot."

Looking a bit apologetic Aeri looks away from the little girl and crosses her arms again. She clears her throat and with one finger twirls her hair. She then coughs somewhat loudly.

"…Thank you," she says masking her words.

Perfectly creating an awkward silence I have no other option but to cough even louder in Aeri's direction.

"Geez…"she mumbles, "so…her sister?"

I nod slowly and then Aeri's face just starts looking very apologetic and completely embarrassed with herself.

"Come on," I say softly to Aeri, "We can't leave her alone."

"Fine…"

We all remain silent for a few seconds, me mostly because I'm surprised. I smile at Aeri and she smiles back. I better not make her regret this.

"Thank you," Sinna mumbles softly almost crying.

Aeri looks at the little girl with teary eyes, I guess, but tries her best to keep her demeaning composure.

"We'll take care of you, if that's ok?" Aeri says softly, "Let's get some yummy food alright?"

I raise my hand to get the waitresses' attention. She comes on over quickly and before making her final approach she stops for a brief second, I get the feeling the overall look of the table isn't a great one.

"Everything alright?" she asks.

I nod gently and smile a little. It's good that this place isn't run by someone who hates red players otherwise we wouldn't even be allowed inside.

I look to my side and see that Aeri switched sides on the table and is now next to Sinna, hugging her close and patting her back. I can't help but to smile widely. Aeri smiles back at me and I just feel a bit better overall about this whole deal.

"Yeah, everything is ok," I huff.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thank you to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

What is up ya beautiful individual yous!? (That is totally a sentence.) So as I hope you guys can see, we are rocking a new cover. I wanted to change it on the last chapter, but this site refused to show I changed it until like six days later. MOVING ON! Regi's POV! This was fun, expect a little more diversity in the coming weeks. Previously all I gave you as all Daath and Al. But the coming chapters have tons of POVs! Also 100th review hype!

So I was talking to mangachiaki, you know her that one user I always thank for proofreading my awful writing? Haha. So we were discussing the possibility of my story PROBABLY switching to an "M" rating in the site. WHY? I hear you ask with amazing surprise. Well first off let me say that this is merely a thought, a proposition. We might not step into "M" rated territory but doing so would allow with a ton of more descriptive freedom. In no way will I make lemons or grotesque violence. Since well for one I think my characters are too established to just freaking write a sex scene with full blown detail when I just never done that. And for the violence thing, SAO doesn't really have any gore aside from the occasional chopping of limbs. The point I'm trying to get it is what do you think guys? Would yo mind if at some point into the future this story went into and "M" rating? Please I urge you to leave a review considering I really need reader feedback for this particular issue. REMEMBER THIS IS JUST A THOUGHT IT MAY OR MAY NOT HAPPEN AT ALL!

Please leave a review if you like what you read, or want to say anything at all! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Back to Basics"


	34. Chapter 34 - Back To Basics

**Chapter 34.- Back To Basics**

**September/ 2****nd**** / 2023**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Tolbana**

**Aeri**

This takes me back; I almost expect to see someone from the guild here. I swing my feet a little and rest both of my palms on the table. This is the table we used to sit at, both to eat and to mess around. I smile slightly, it was so calm back then.

Al, Elina, Esra, Owl, Kayla…Daath.

I smile a bit wider, there's no more use in crying. There's nothing I can do about what happened anyways. Better focus on the good times…the good times we had. The inn keeper approaches me, with that robotic yet kind smile on her face.

"What are you having today?"

"Just bring me some breakfast, lots of ale to drink as well," I say.

She slowly nods and goes away to fetch my food.

"I thought you didn't like eating alone."

I turn my head slightly to the side and see Regi, he sits next to me and bumps me slightly to the side. I bump him back with my hip and he just laughs slightly. He stretches his arms up and yawns loudly.

"Hey is-"

"Yes yes, she is still sleeping," he says.

I smile a little and lean my head on his shoulder.

"She seems to be doing better, right?" I ask, sounding a bit unsure.

"Well yeah, at least we got her to do something yesterday."

"Hehe, yeah, she is very good at hunting."

"Should we wake her up soon? I want to get this over with." he explains.

I stop leaning on him and scooch away a little. I rest my elbows on the table and hold my head with my hands. I sigh out loudly and pout. Regi sighs as well and scoots closer to me, placing his hand on my arm and rubbing it comfortingly.

"Come on, it'll be good for you and her," he says, "It's better to get this out of your systems."

"But what if I don't want to huh?" I say, "You stop to think about that?"

He retreats a bit, tacitly confirming what I already suspected: he didn't stop to think about me at all while planning Sinna's future. I turn away from him and he sighs again, placing his hand on my shoulder and trying to turn me towards him again. I don't budge and just keep myself rigid.

"You just kind of confirm my worries," he says.

I whirl around, wondering what he meant by that

"What worries?"

He scratches his head and uncomfortably refuses to look me in the eye. Something scratches angrily in the recesses of my mind but I decided to ignore it for the time being.

"Mor…ning."

We look to the side at the same time and see Sinna, dragging a pillow behind her. She walks over to me and takes a seat on my lap. I don't mind much, since she's so cute; I've gotten used to her unsolicited familiarity. Getting comfortable on my lap she lifts her pillow and puts it over the table, only to lean over and rest her head on it. Regi chuckles slightly and then looks at me. I make sure I'm making the kind of face that say "we are not done talking" and he looks away quickly trying to act as if he didn't notice.

"How did you sleep sweetie?" I ask and slowly brush my fingers through her hair.

"You kicked me like twice," Sinna mumbles.

I laugh out loud a little and keep stroking her silky hair with my hand.

"I'm sorry," I say.

"It's ok," she mumbles.

I pat her head gently and find myself still running my fingers through her soft hair. The NPC returns with my food soon after, which disrupts Sinna's sleep and, by extension, my peaceful aura. Sinna sits up and pushes the pillow to Regi.

"I'd like to have what she got, please," Regi says.

The NPC nods with a smile and leaves shortly after. Sinna now resting her weight on my chest sighs deeply. After a bit of adjusting, I reach around Sinna to take a piece of bread. She notices my awkward position and helpfully moves from my lap to the seat adjacent to me. There's something about bacon and eggs, even though I've had better before I just like how NPC food tastes from time to time.

"You promised me you were going to tell me," Sinna says.

"Tell you about what?" I ask.

"Your guild, from before," she says.

"Oh…right," Regi coughs.

"What do you want to know though?" I question.

Sinna presses her finger against her lips and ponders for a few seconds. I continue eating my breakfast and the NPC arrives with Regi's stuff. Setting the food right in-front of Regi she smiles and takes her leave.

"What was the name?" she asks, "Your guild's name?"

"Steel and Swords," I answer, feeling a faint smile take over my face.

I'm pretty sure Regi notices and he smiles slightly as well as he starts to eat.

"Wow, that name is super cool!" Sinna exclaims.

"Isn't it?" Regi asks rhetorically, pushing his eggs in front of Sinna. "Here, eat some of mine."

Sinna just nods and with a fork starts picking away at the scrambled eggs. She gets a dumb amount of food in her mouth and asks another question before even swallowing.

"What about the people?" she asks with a considerable amount of difficulty.

"Hey finish that first," I say, trying my best not to chuckle.

I grab my mug of ale and take a good long sip out of it. I slam the mug down as I almost finish it and let out a big sigh of satisfaction. Fake alcohol with breakfast, it doesn't get any better than that. Sinna swallows her food and clears her throat.

"What about the other people in your guild?" she asks, "Were they nice people?"

"Yeah," Regi and I say together.

We lock our gaze for a few seconds and smile fondly at each other. He takes a bite out of the bread on his plate and then just stares away into nothing, probably just reminiscing about our time in the guild. Pretty much like I am. I would be lying if I said I didn't miss everyone, I really do, I miss them very much.

"Excluding that asswipe Yu…" Regi says, "There were eleven of us?"

"Yeah, eleven," I say and suddenly grow very very nostalgic. "Kayla, Elina, Owl, Esra, Ruri, Twyla, Kato, Al…Daath."

Regi looks at me with troubled eyes as I finish my sentence. What am I to do though? Do I just brush it off, I've been trying my best to get over this, I really have. There's no way it'll ever be easy though, things never are. I kind of feel bad, reeling Regi into this emotional roller coaster of mine. What makes me feel worse is that I've been lying to him. He doesn't know what I feel for him is partly because I'm trying to get over Daath. All this affection, this…intimacy we've shared is merely because he was there when I needed someone, not because I feel the same way as I did for Daath. Regi is…as bad as it may sound my stepping stone in all of this.

"Were you guys good friends?" Sinna asks.

"Yeah, we were all pretty close," I say.

"We did all kinds of stuff together, hunting monsters, treasure hunting, quests, material gathering…" Regi says softly, "It was pretty fun."

"It sounds like fun!" Sinna says through yet another mouthful of eggs.

"Hey, don't talk with your mouth full!" I scold.

She gives me half a grin and turns her head away to finish eating what's in her mouth.

"So what exactly do you want us to do today?" I ask Regi, making sure to sound annoyed.

He sets his mug down and glances away, silently musing.

"We're going to the Monument of Life," he says.

"Again?" I grouse.

"I want to give something to sis," Sinna mutters.

I feel somewhat guilty, since even I'm not blind as to why I don't want to go there. I don't want to see his name. I don't want to be reminded of what happened, I saw it happen after all… But even a little girl like Sinna must be looking for some kind of closure. After all, if what Regi told me is true she didn't have much time to say anything to her sister before she died.

"What is that?" Regi asks with a smile.

Sinna starts going through her menu and selects an item that has the icon that clearly says that it's a player made item. A stuffed bunny appears in front of her, sitting just slightly to the side of her plate.

"Sis…gave me this a long time ago," she says softly, "I used it when I couldn't sleep, it made me feel brave when I was scared."

"You sure you won't need it anymore?" Regi asks.

"Sis needs it more than I do now," Sinna says as she tries her best to smile.

I look away as I feel I might cry any second now. I breathe in deeply and try to suppress the feelings Sinna is slowly forcing out of me. Dammit. Not knowing for how much longer I'll hold on I stand up and start heading for the door.

"Let's get going then," I huff and open the door.

I step outside and hug the nearby wall. Here I am drowning in self-pity and this little girl has it worse than I have. When did I become this pathetic? Daath is gone, and I need to accept it. But…I don't want to…I'm scared, ever since that day I'm so scared. Scared of realizing this is not some bad dream. Regi comes out of the inn and quickly approaches me.

"See?" he asks wearily, "It'll be good for you too."

"Shut up…" I say bitterly.

He just sighs and walks past me. Sinna comes out of the inn, she holds the bunny in her arms and walks up to me with a smile. Her smile slowly fades away as she looks at me.

"Are you ok?" she asks tilting her head to the side.

"Yes, yeah I'm alright," I say awkwardly.

She takes hold of my hand and pulls me along gently as she starts following Regi.

"Let's go," she says with a giggle.

"Yeah… Sure" I say reluctantly.

* * *

"I don't know why I never expected to be back here," Regi says, "Even more so after you guys recruited me."

I avoid even looking at Regi, I look at my own feet as we walk through the city's gate. Sinna clutches a bit tightly on my right hand but I just put one foot in-front of the other, slightly dragging them on the floor. It's not like I want to hide the fact that I don't want to be here anyways. Actually I'm trying to make it as obvious as possible. I step forward, eyes fixed on my feet, but I glance up due to morbid curiosity. Regi is staring at me with a worried look. One that I quickly send away as I "tsk" at him.

"Come on, don't be like that," he says, sounding quite offended.

"I didn't ask to come here," I retort.

"I know that, but maybe you need to be here," he says simply.

I "tsk" at him again and this time I turn my head to Sinna who is worriedly clutching at her stuffed bunny.

"Are you ok sweetie?"

"I'm just a bit nervous…" she says softly.

I crouch next to her, gently taking her hands in mine. I smile at her and brush a bit of her hair out of her forehead. She smiles a little and then in a bit of disbelief hangs her head.

"It's ok to be nervous, you must have a ton of things to say to your big sis," I say, really doing my best to try and ease her up a little.

"Tons of things," she says and nods.

You precious little thing.

"Then relax ok?" I say confidently and look back at Regi, he is still giving me that worried look, "I…also have a few things to say to someone."

"You do?"

I nod and ruffle her hair a little, with a smile I stand straight and take hold of her hand again. She seems more at ease now, she holds the bunny from its ears, loosely dangling from her grip. I find this whole little display of mine a bit funny. Sinna changed my life quite drastically, I guess in a way I always wanted a little sister. Having an older sister isn't always that fun, but I always wanted someone that looked up to me. Someone who came to me for advice. It feels…nice, to have someone who does all these things.

I feel guilty though, at first I didn't want Sinna to be with us. I was more than ready to just kick her out the door when Regi brought her with him. Just a young little girl recently robbed of her sister and I was more than ready to leave her to her luck in this messed up world. Her constant optimism, always shining through her cute smile, reminds me of Elina.

I snap out of my thoughts and shake my head violently as I see we have arrived to a structure with a dark tunnel that leads to a very dim lighted room. I'm not comfortable whenever I start overthinking things, even more so if it's about what has happened in the past. I sigh deeply and feel that Sinna let's go of my hand. She takes a few steps into the tunnel and turns around to look at Regi.

"Show me please, I'm ready to talk to sis," she says with a soft smile.

My withered heart breaks a bit yet again. I've recently come to realize that I have an unbelievable weak spot for innocence. Thoughts of a particular, big individual come to me as he is practically the only one who would mock me about it. Dwelling too much on the past Aeri…

Regi takes hold of Sinna's hand and slowly walks with her to the insides of the structure. I stay back, still feeling weird, sad, enraged, and many other things. I don't even go into the tunnel. I just cross my arms and stare without saying a word as Regi and Sinna proceed deeper into the place.

"Hmph…" I exclaims, kind of hoping they stop.

They don't.

I nervously tap my foot on the floor and shift my position a few times. Tap. Tap. Tap. I sigh very loudly and let my arms hang at my sides. Reluctantly I walk slowly into the structure. I walk without really wanting to, but as I already said to Sinna…I do have some things to say to someone. I make it to the end of the tunnel and into the room lighted by weak torches. Regi and Sinna are only slightly ahead of me now.

"Here," Regi mutters as he selects a name on the so called Monument of Life.

His selection expands and I get closer. Meira, Sinna's big sister. With my right hand I clutch at my left arm and feel very sad for some reason. I really try not to even look at the crossed out name, she must hate me, I mean who wouldn't hate someone who was just about to reject your lil sis for help. I turn my head over to Sinna to distract myself a bit, but it's no prettier sight. She stands there, just a foot away from the monument, staring at her sister's name with teary eyes.

**-****Meira****-**

**-Player Killed-**

**-3:11 P.M.-**

**-August 19, 2023-**

Regi takes a few steps back to be closer to me and wraps his arm around me. I don't exactly shove him away but feel a very strong need to do so. Unwillingly I let him embrace me and we just watch Sinna as she stands in-front of us, staring at her sister's name.

"Hi sis," Sinna huffs.

Immediately I feel my eyes water a bit and hold my right hand up to my mouth.

"I know you can't answer… I know that. But, I wanted to talk with you, It has been a while since I list did. I miss you sis, I miss you a lot," she says and then pauses for a bit. "Is it pretty where you are right now? I hope it is, you always said heaven is supposed to be very pretty."

I feel a few tears run down my face but do my best to keep my composure. Sinna approaches the slab and places her bunny under the column where Meira's name is. Very gently she sets it down and pats its head before stepping back again.

"Remember him? You made him for me, on the first days, when I was scared and wanted to see mom again. You told me to hug him every time I was scared or missed mom. It made me feel better," she says, her voice not even wavering in the slightest. "You need it more than I do now, you must feel scared and alone. And I bet you miss mom too. Be sure to hug him as much as I did."

I feel myself exhale, feeling rather pained. Regi holds me a bit close and rubs my back. Sinna's word combined with my own feelings towards this place do not help me with these dumb tears.

"Regi and Aeri are taking care of me now, I like thinking I also take care of them," she says and giggles slightly. "I'll be ok, I will still miss you lots though, but I'll be ok. I love you Meira."

She breathes in deeply and slowly turns around to face us, I hide my face immediately by burying it on Regi's chest. Seconds later I feel Sinna tugging at my hand, I turn around and see her looking up at me with a happy face. She smiles widely and pulls me slightly away from Regi.

"Are you going to talk with your friend now?"

I make a weird frown and then turn my head to Regi, he is still giving me that look, it annoys me a little but I know I need this. I never properly said good bye anyways. I never properly said many things. Quietly I walk to the left side of the slab. It takes but a few seconds to find the name I'm looking for, after all it's one of the first on its column.

**-****Daath****-**

**-Player Killed-**

**-4:46-**

**-February 20, 2023-**

Tears start running frantically down my face. Despite my desperate reluctance, loud pathetic sobs echo around the room. I place my palms on the slab and rest my forehead against Daath's name. I keep crying, wailing like a child at the crossed out name.

"I never got say goodbye…" I cry, "I never got to tell you a lot of things Daath. I never got to know your real name, I never got to tell you mine… I never got to tell you that I love you…"

Realizing what I just said out loud I turn my head quickly to catch a quick glimpse of Regi, a sad expression plagues his face, almost looking melancholic. I stare at him, feeling bad about myself. His expression doesn't stay the same much longer, he then just smiles gently at me. The same comforting look he always seems to have. I can't bear look at him any longer and turn around again. I'm such a hypocrite.

I stop crying like a little child and push myself off the slab. I look at his name some more, I trace my fingers over the crossed out letters and practically whimper once I'm done.

I'm sorry Daath, there's so many things I wish I could've told you. So many things I wanted to share with you and I can't now. You are gone…there's no way you'll come back…

I breathe in roughly, my nose making that stuffy sound as I do. I wipe my tears away and under my nose with my wrist.

"Are you mad at me?" I whisper and over my shoulder quickly glance at Regi, "Am I a bad person Daath? Will you forgive me?"

I remain quiet for a few minutes after that. In a dumb way I was half expecting to hear an answer. No matter if it were him or just me…losing my mind or something. I would kill to hear his voice one last time. I turn around and sigh. Sinna curiously approaches me.

"Are you ok?"

I nod and pat her head.

"Let's go back to Tolbanna, I'm hungry," I say and laugh a little, "tired too."

She nods with a smile and I walk with her past Regi. I don't have the face to even look him in the eye right now. I almost feel like those girls back at school that gave the cold shoulder to anyone they didn't like. Just like those bitches.

I make small talk with Sinna as we walk hand in hand through Starting City, then out on the plains on our way to Tolbanna. The three of us reach the inn and we have a big meal, awkwardly I try to avoid any kind of contact with Regi. I just can't handle to explain why I said what I said. We are barely through half of the afternoon but Sinna already left to sleep, the day must have taken its toll on her. I remain sitting at the table, a cup of water between my hands. Regi sits in-front of me, not doing much either, he just finishes drinking out of his mug and sets it back down on table.

"You know," he says, "I kind of suspected it to be honest."

"What?"

"You know, this whole deal with us," he explains, "I knew it was sort of to try and get over something. I just wanted to ignore it I guess."

"Regi…it's not like that."

"No. No, it's ok. I get it, I guess…" he mutters. "It's my fault anyways for thinking it was something else other than that. I've always been kind of an idiot…"

I feel pained by his words, it's true in a way. He was there at a time where I was vulnerable, that I needed someone, and I took advantage of that.

"But…it's different now," I say.

"Yeah, it is," he replies. "Which is why we'll be stopping."

"What?"

"Yeah," he says. "This is obviously not helping you, and if I'm honest I don't want to be part of your coping process. At least not this way. Don't get me wrong, I'll be here for whatever you need. Just…not like I have been."

"Please Regi, I…please I need you," I cry.

"And I'll be here, just not like that…" he says. "I mean I like you and god knows we've gone above and beyond what I consider to be a regular couple relationship… I'm not going to be a stand in for Daath, I'm sorry."

I'm filled with nothing but anger and self-disgust, he hit the nail right in the head. I tighten my grip around my cup of water until it cracks slightly. The feeling of crying wells up inside of me but this time my mettle is enough to hold it back. I'm such a crappy human being. With half a smile I look up at him, he is clearly upset but even beyond that gaze I can still feel his warm, caring look.

"I'm sorry," I whimper.

"Just…think nothing of it," he says and stands up. "I'll see you in the morning."

Alone. Alone again, I guess I deserve it. After all he is right, he was dead on right. I was lonely, I was in pain. It was easy to just use Regi to make myself feel better. But even now I'm sad, even if I was just using him…he was mine to use. In a fit of anger I slap the cup off the table and slam my fists on it as I get up.

Dammit….Dammit. Unsure of what to even do with myself I draw my sword and head for the door. I'm going to hunt monsters to cool off.

* * *

Sluggishly I make my way to my room. I took longer than expected, Sinna must be sleeping so I open the door slowly and try hard not to make a sound as I enter. Once in I throw the door behind me and it slams shut doing quite a bit of noise. Immediately I slam my palm against my forehead and sigh as I see Sinna quickly rise from the bed.

"Aeri?" she asks drowsily

"I'm sorry sweetie, go back to sleep alright?"

I sit on the bed and take off my clothes to slip into something more comfortable. I equip my pajamas and get under the covers close to Sinna. She turns around and gets close to me, cuddling her head right under my jaw.

"Daath," she says, "Daath was very important to you, no?"

"Yes, very."

"I'm sure he is not mad at you…" she mutters, "He would forgive you, you are a nice person, the nicest I know."

I raise an eyebrow and find myself with my mouth wide open.

"H-how?"

I look down at her and lean back a bit to see her with a wide smile.

"Straining," she says as she points at her ear.

I hold her close and laugh a little even though I do this a tear slips out of my eye.

"Thanks."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thanks to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

Thank you all for your feedback, three of you left it in your reviews and others approached me via PM. Considering your means of letting me know I'll only comment on the ones who left a reviews since I assume the private message is sort of meant to be kept private. **Velcar:** That is actually quite a neat idea. I would need to craft extra chapters for it but I see no harm in considering and it could be quite fun for me to write. However it is something I need to think real hard about.(On a personal note I think putting up what would basically be another fic under my name on this section would look at tad bit greedy and maybe take away some of my attention from my my story focus right here. However it is something to be considered, thank you so much for the suggestion.) **ICO: **Not only are you named as one of my favorite PS2 games but you might just be as deep as it. For you that don't know ICO left us an interesting bit of text detailing his opinion on this "M" rating stuff. Glad to know you wouldn't mind this change if it comes to it. **rfpaulino1987: **Just a quick say on how your comment brought a bit of life to my little heart, glad you would keep reading as well!

Now, I know what you are all thinking! (I hope...I'm totally psychic and stuff.) IS AL AND THE GANG OK!? ARE ELINA AND ESRA STILL AFRAID OF EDELWIESS? WHEN WILL WE GET ANOTHER RURI CHAPTER!? Not only are those last two question a bit too specific reader but, I happen to be able to answer them super vaguely to further increase this curiosity I psychically assume you have. In that order! Wait 2 weeks. Yes, big lizards are scary. Probably sometime.

As always, if you like what you read, feel like giving me some criticism or just want to get something out of that pretty head of yours don't hesitate to leave a review. I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Retrospect"


	35. Chapter 35 - Retrospect

**Chapter 35.- Retrospect**

**June/ 22****nd**** / 2022**

**Mirai**

"Watanabe Aeri?" Asks a woman who just entered the room.

She paces slowly from the door and sits next to the man who just a few minutes ago finished interviewing me. She sits next to him and I nervously adjust my position on my chair.

"That's me," I say with a big smile and tilt my head a little to the side.

The man sits next to this really beautiful woman on the other side of a rather expensive looking wooden table. There's three glasses of water on top of the table. One for the man, one for the woman, and I can only assume the other one is there for me. I've refused to touch it despite feeling quite thirsty.

The woman leans forward to give me an analytical look, her eyes slowly going through every inch of my being.

"That pseudonym is great, perfect for a pretty girl like you," she says.

"What? That's not her real name?" the man asks.

She stares blankly at him, clearly unamused.

"Of course it isn't, did you even read her form?" she groans sounding very annoyed. "She is one of the few that cares enough to even fill that field. Even worse you jackass, you didn't even care to read the name of the field. Did you?"

"I'm so sorry Miss Tokegawa," the man apologizes.

"Sorry is right."

I glance around the room, trying to distract myself from the tension between the two other occupants. The office is nicely furnished and the walls are plastered with posters and promos for idol groups and solo idols. Every girl looks adorable, smiling broadly in cute, albeit impractical outfits. I look back at this Miss Tokegawa and her assistant just in time to see her take away my form from the poor man's hands.

"So, your real name is...Kanada Mirai," she says as her eyes widen in surprise. "Why not use that? It's also really pretty."

"I'm not really comfortable using my real name for this," I reply with a very weak smile.

"I see, that's totally alright," she says and eyes me a little more. "Why didn't you try to be a model? I picture you more in photo shoots and in magazines. I'll definitely have to see your demo song but, that's just my humble opinion."

I mask my grimace with a forced smile.

"I'm not exactly good with stuff like that." I reply.

"Well, fair enough, this interview isn't for that anyways," she says. "So what brought you to us today? Why do you want us to produce you as an idol? What makes you better than the other ten girls that have entered my office today?"

Finally the question I've been waiting to be asked in all of the time I've been here.

"I love playing music, I love singing, and dancing. All those things are a really huge part of my life. I…uhh I actually brought my guitar but they didn't let me bring it up here for some reason. I also th-"

"Yeah yeah, they all say that, but what makes you special?" Tokegawa asks with a grin. "What are you willing to do for us to make you a star?"

"Anything!" I answer quickly.

"Really now?" she asks bluntly. "Do you even know where most idols start out from?"

Most of my knowledge starts at the fact that I know most popular idols start on gag show and do bits for lesser known television shows. But I've got something not everyone else has. Even if it sounds smug, I'm just confident about myself and about what I can bring to the table.

"I do bu-"

"Listen girl please do not waste my time I'm a really busy wo-"

"No!" I say blindly.

Miss Tokegawa stares at me with this really upset frown and is about to open her mouth when I interrupt again.

"Please, just listen to my song, hear me play, hear me sing please!" I beg.

"You have some serious balls," she says. "While I like something other than a meek little girl you will not raise your voice at me. Out of my office, now!"

I bite my lip, regretting every word that came out of my mouth. I prance over to the door, feet leaden and unwilling to allow me to exit. Never have a felt so much regret. Maybe if I kept quite or did something different. I close the door behind me and rest my back on it. Sighing deeply I try not to cry. I'm about to get off the door when I hear something familiar. My song.

I hear my voice softly humming as I strike simple cords on the guitar. I place my head closer to the door and I can hear it a little clearer. They are listening to my demo. Enthusiastically I keep my ear pressed to the door. Mouthing the words as my voice comes out of the speakers on the other side of the door. Ten seconds go by, then twenty, then thirty. I try my best not to squeal as they seem to be up to listening to my whole song. Suddenly my music stops and I hear fast, hurried steps towards me.

"Kanada!" the woman screams loudly right in my face, "Oh, you stayed."

I smile widely and she rolls her eyes at me.

"Come in before I change my mind," she says.

Gladly I walk past her and sit on the chair I was sitting some seconds ago. Tokegawa's assistant smiles brightly at me.

"You have a pretty voice."

"Thank you," I reply quickly.

It's probably the third time someone has complimented my singing. A stranger of all people, my heart almost skips a bit and I just smile like an idiot.

Tokegawa takes her sit next to her assistant and crosses her arms.

"I won't repeat myself," she huffs.

I nod acknowledging her and put my hands on my lap. I lean my body forward as well and do everything possible to make her feel like she has my full, undivided attention.

"You have potential and I haven't seen anyone with it in quite a while, so I'm willing to invest in you," she explains. "According to your form you are fifteen and about to turn sixteen, so I can't exactly start you out in show where they would take advantage of your age and things of the sort. Now answer me this. How long do you need to come up with at least another song?"

"Two weeks, I can do it in two weeks!" I answer.

"Good girl, you really are willing," she says. "I will set a gig up for you, nothing big at all, you'll be out in the street performing I will provide you with a small stage and a drummer. If that goes well, I might keep you."

Despite her harsh wording, I'm beyond excited; if I weren't under close scrutiny, I'd be screeching with joy.

"We have your information, now leave. My new assistant will contact you soon."

"New?" the man asks surprised, a heavy hint of fear in his expression.

As commanded I get off my butt and almost running leave the little room. Once the door is closed behind me I squeal like a little girl and run past the secretary, to the elevator.

"Hey, no running!"

"I'm sorry!" I yell back.

I press the button pointing down and anxiously wait for the thing to get to my floor.

"Come on. Come on," I say as I press the button repeatedly.

Everyone knows that makes the elevator go faster, it's a fact. The thing finally arrives and I practically try to force the doors open. Hastily stepping inside I then start repeatedly pressing the button to the lobby. This really dumb jingle plays in the backgrounds but I can't help to tap along to its tune with my foot.

The elevator "dings" and I burst out running towards the exit of the building. Outside I almost crash with a group of men in suits, but manage to stop myself just before I get anyone hurt.

"Mirai."

"Jun!" I say gleefully and whirl around.

A familiar voice, that of a friend. A boy I hold very dearly in my heart. I jump at him and hug him with all my strength.

"They gave me a chance!" I say.

"What? How? I mean congratulations but, how?" he asks.

"They listened to my song!" I say, "They gave me two weeks to come up with another one, I'm going to perform!"

I look up at him and see a big, gently smile on his face. The combination you get out of someone being proud and completely happy for you. I feel my cheeks get a bit rosy and I just hide my face in his chest.

"Thank you," I mumble into him.

His hand gently pats my head and then he just all out ruffles my hair everywhere.

"It was all you," he says.

"No it wasn't!" I protest. "You were the one that said to try out with an agency. You helped me get here."

"Come on now, I only told you where to look," he says.

He hands my guitar and I swing it behind my back, pushing my arms through the straps of its bag. He starts walking away slowly and it takes me a few seconds to realize he is leaving me.

"Hey, don't leave me here!" I whine as I catch up to him.

"I wasn't."

"You were!"

He laughs soundly and again ruffles my hair.

"So what are we going to do with the rest of our day?" he asks.

"I uhm…I was wondering maybe, if you aren't busy…" I mumble.

He stares at me, raising an eyebrow. I try to wipe away any trace of embarrassment off of my face and clear my throat loudly.

"I…well I was thinking maybe you could help me with my homework?"

"Mirai, how bold, inviting a young stud like myself to your house. Just what are you up to?" he teases.

I punch his arm as hard as I can.

"Shut up!"

"You are so easy to read," he says. "That's why I like you."

Through the crowded streets and tall buildings we find ourselves in a small park. A swing set and a slide in the middles of the roaring district, quite the funny sight. Not losing any time I run for the swing set and stand on it, swinging forwards with great force.

"What happened to me helping you with your homework?" Jun says.

"We have time to kill, besides didn't you hear?" I say and keep swinging myself. "I'm going to become an idol soon I won't have time to waste like this."

"Psh, sure sure Aeri Watanabe," he mocks. "Just don't forget about me when you are rich and famous alright?"

I jump off the swing and aim right for Jun. I topple him to the ground and fall right on top of him.

"How could I forget you?"

"I wouldn't put it above you," he says and playfully grabs my chin, pulling my closer to his face. "I mean you barely remember your multiplication tables."

I back away quickly and sit up, still on top of him.

"Oh geez, shut up…" I say. "Of course I know my multiplication tables…I just don't sit at them very often."

He starts laughing like a maniac and I see him reach for his stomach.

"You should really stop playing video games and reading manga, it's making you even dumber than you already are," he says.

"Hey! Hey! Shut up, ok?" I say and poke his chest.

"Don't let this idol thing change you alright?" he says. "I like you the way you are."

There's no way I would let that happen, I would never let money or fame change the way I am to my friends or family. I will only grow from this, and I won't turn my back on anyone. Especially not on Jun, not on the one person that helped, not on the one person that believed in me, not on the one person that I love.

"I won't, I promise."

* * *

**September/ 10****th**** / 2022**

"You even started skipping school all together."

"I know…I'm sorry," I speak softly to the phone, "I'll make it up to you alright? I promise."

"Another promise?" he asks harshly.

"I…I'm sorry, Jun."

"No, I'm sorry," he breathes. "That was a little mean of me, I know you've been busy."

"I'll call you when I'm done with this interview, maybe we can meet up for coffee?" I propose.

"Sounds nice, I'll wait for your call then."

"Jun I-" I say but he already hung up, "I miss you…"

I sigh deeply and hold my cellphone in-front of my face. One minute and fifteen seconds, that's the longest I've talked to Jun in the last month. The call timer slowly fades away and it leaves me feeling empty, weird, and kind of distraught. The screen quickly turns off and I see my own reflection, and the feeling only deepens.

"Problems with that boy again?"

I quickly jerk my body around and hide my cellphone behind my back. Tokegawa's new assistant, Kyoko. She approaches me and I relax once I realize it's not the boss lady herself.

"Jun, right?" she asks.

I nod and sigh from the bottom of my being again. She gives me a sympathetic smile and tilts her head a little to the side.

"You'll work it out," she says. "I'm sure not many boys can resist your charms."

As she says this she approaches me and fixes my hair a little. I let her fix up my hair and I quietly sulk.

"I've messed it up too many times with him…" I whine. "If I don't make things better he'll never speak to me again"

"Oh come on, I'm sure you can clear up the misunderstandings," she says.

She takes out a small brush out of her back pocket and fixes my make-up as well. Feeling the ticklish ends of it I back my face up a bit and play a bit hard to get for Kyoko.

"Come on now, you need to look pretty," she says.

"Ehh…why? It's a radio interview," I complain. "It's not like anyone is going to see me."

"You know how Miss Tokegawa is," Kyoko explains. "Now come on, don't make me chase you."

I stay still and let her go about her business. I nervously clutch my cellphone, wishing for this to be over so I can go see Jun. Kyoko quickly finishes up and the stares at her handiwork.

"All nice and pretty, now head to the recording room, I reckon you'll be starting soon," she says.

I nod and head out the small room they set up for us to wait in. Down the narrow hallway I go to a red door. I open it and I'm harshly pulled in by someone.

"Finally you are here," says Tokegawa as she pulls on me. "They are about to start, now hurry."

She opens a door to a little recording room and pushes me inside. Thanks to a man on the other side I'm able to regain my balance quickly. Grabbing my arms he sets me in-front of him and I just giggle uncomfortably.

"Aeri, great to meet you," the man says and stretches his hand out for me to shake. "I'm a fan."

I enthusiastically shake his hand and then bow a little.

"I'm always glad to meet my fans!" I say.

I've gotten used to this sudden mood changes, can't be all sad and sulky when I have work. "All smiles and no care in the world", as Tokegawa likes to put it. I have to be the upstanding image of a happy girl. Slightly dumb, energetic, with a hint of that happy go lucky attitude. I've grown to hate it, but at the same time find solace in it. Lately I've grown apart from my friends, my family…from Jun. In a way it helps me push through whenever I'm feeling sort of sad. But…I hate it.

"Now please take a seat we'll be on the airwaves shortly," the man says and points to a chair next to a table.

The table has these huge microphones over it, tons of disposable coffee cups and random bits and scraps of paper. I take my seat and grab the set of headphones neatly placed just in-front of my seat. The man gives me a thumbs up and I put them on over my head, for the moment I cradle them on my neck and wait for him to take his seat.

"First time on the radio?"

"Yeah, I'm super excited," I reply.

"Just put those on and wait for my cue; you'll hear me over on your headphones," he states.

I nod again, with that fake overflowing enthusiasm and put the headphones over my ears. Everything else gets silent, I cannot hear anything at all. It feels nice, it feels peaceful.

"And we are back folks!" the man yells with that loud yet soft voice at the microphone.

Well that was short lived.

"I have a surprise for you today!" he announces. "I have here in my studio, the fast rising idol! The one and only Watanabe! Aeri!"

He nods at me with a confident look and does a weird signal with his hand. I'm guessing that's my cue.

"Hi everyone! I'm so glad to be here!"

"So please tell us. What does it feel to so quickly be rising into stardom?" he asks. "It's been just a few months since…"

His words just start buzzing in my head. I know what he is going to ask and I know what I'm going to answer. I've only done this interview about four times in the last two days. Answer with a smile and a cheery tune, be as outgoing as you can. Tokegawa forces me to sell this image. Since I didn't start out as most idols I was forced to fabricate this weird personality instead of letting my work shape it.

"Oh wow that must be a fantastic feeling! What else can you tell us about yourself?"

Like a robot I answer, keeping the information vague and klutzy. Purposely pretending to be nervous and messing up some of my words as I talk. Aeri shines the brightest when she is cute and forgetful. I'm complaining alright, before I started all of this I just had a way different idea in how things would play out. I thought I would be happy, like, actually happy. Instead whenever I'm not pretending to be someone else I'm sad and bitter. I shut myself in my room and either sleep or play video games. Do something to take my mind of things. Before I started getting popular I would go out with Jun, we would eat together or just do nothing. But it was soothing, it was nice. I blame myself for how much I've been distanced from him. Some situations were out of my control, yes. But some others I just wanted to be left alone. This obviously comes off as me being bitchy. I understand that but it's not like I want to be away from him.

"I hear from your manager, you've finally have a big gig coming up," he says. "Are you ready to rock your fans on Akasaka Blitz?"

"What?" I ask, my tone completely falling out of character.

I quickly clear my throat and giggle loudly.

"I had no idea!" I correct myself.

"There you have it folks, a surprise for our cute idol herself!" he announces. "I'm glad to be the first to announce that you'll be able to sing and dance along with rising idol Watanabe Aeri on her first live show this first of November only on Akasaka Blitz!"

The interview comes to an ending and I'm left a bit speechless. I take my headphones off and say my good byes to the radio man before storming out of the recording room. Kyoko is waiting for me with a smile, one which I rather quickly erase off her face.

"Where is she?!" I question her as I grab her arms.

"In the rest room…" she answers nervously.

Speed walking I burst out into the hallway and go down to the rest room. Luckily before I get there I see Tokegawa come out of the door.

"What the hell was that about?!"

"Watch your tone Kanada, I just got you your first live performance and this is how you treat me?" Tokegawa replies.

I nervously pace around the small hallway and cross my arms. I weird mixture of excitement and anger courses around inside of me. My first live show. I've performed on parks and streets so far but Akasaka is a real music venue! I grin before returning to this issue at hand.

"Why didn't you tell me about this before?" I ask.

"It was supposed to be a surprise, geez if I knew you were going to react like this I would've just told you before the interview."

Akasaka Blitz, that place holds a little over a thousand people. The surge of adrenaline suddenly runs through me again. Did I really make it? It's no Tokyo Budokan, but it's a thousand people or more!

"Do I get any tickets?"

"Hmm, I guess I can get you a couple," she says. "Wanna invite your mom or something?"

"Of course!" I scream in excitement.

"I'll see what I can do, for now let us celebrate!" she says.

A bit weirded out I tilt my head and raise an eyebrow at the actually cheerful sentence coming out of my manager's mouth.

"Oh don't give me that face, we'll go out and get drunk and…uh Kyoko and I will get drunk and you can eat as much as you like! My treat!" she says.

"Yay, drinks!" Kyoko says from behind me.

"But if you want to get drink too we can go to a place where they can turn a bit of a blind eye," Tokegawa adds with a wink.

She puts her arm around me and drags me along with her. Rush and excitement, that's all I can feel in my body. For the first time in a long while a genuine smile takes over my face and I feel happy. I'll be able to sing for a lot of people, a lot of people will hear me out. As we go down the elevator I feel some kind of emptiness in my stomach, that weird feeling of anxiety you get when you are forgetting something but can't quite place your finger on it.

"I think I'm forgetting something…" I mumble.

"I got your bag from the break room don't worry," Kyoko reassures me.

"No…it's not that…"

* * *

**October/ 27****th**** / 2022**

"Will you be ordering anything miss?"

"Just a cup of green tea please," I answer softly.

The waitress goes away with my order and I'm left alone on the small wooden table, a chair stands opposite from where I seat, it's empty but looking at it makes me smile. Jun and I finally had time to meet each other after the longest time. And we agreed to meet here on our favorite coffee shop. Excited doesn't even begin to describe how I'm feeling.

Out of my handbag I take out two tickets, my show is just around the corner and I want Jun to be there. The extra one is just in case he wants to invite his mom, another person who I just adore. She was also quite supportive of me pursing music and I remember spending countless hours at Jun's house just being pampered by her. I want her to go see me as well if possible.

"Hi."

I turn my body slightly and hide the tickets under the table. Jun is standing just next to me, I smile widely and I' just about to stand up to hug him when he just strafes by and sits opposite of me. I try to shake off the feeling of awkwardness but it just seems to linger on.

"How are yo-"

"I was half expecting you not to come," he interrupts me.

"That's mean Jun," I say and laugh halfheartedly.

Something's off.

"You've been so busy I don't know what to think," he says, putting a really uncomfortable emphasis on the "busy".

I cough and clear my throat, trying not to make it look like I'm not really ok with the tone in which he said his sentence.

"I'm…sorry I have been caught up with a lot of things…" I admit.

"I heard you got a big show coming up," he states, "You know. It really sucks to find out about that on a random blog instead of you."

"I…well I wanted to give you a surprise…" I reply.

His tone, and stare make me feel so bad, so much I almost want to cry but somehow I manage to contain my own feelings. And keep trying to keep a straight face. I clench my hands around the tickets under the table and clear my throat somewhat loudly.

"Well, what kind of surprise?"

I bring my hands up over the table, the now slightly crumpled tickets in my hands.

"I wanted…I want you to come," I say softly, "I want you to come to my show!"

"Of course I'll go," he says with more soft spoken tone, "Why the two tickets though?"

"I thought maybe you could bring your mo-"

"Oh awesome, I'll take my girlfriend," he says, "That way she can finally meet you."

"Gir-Girlfriend?" I echo.

"Yeah I have been wanting for you guys to meet for such a long while now."

My mouth feels dry all of the sudden. I think I can't really say I'm surprised. Jun is a handsome guy, of course he would get a girlfriend. Of course he would overlook a dumb girl like me. Of course he would be in love with someone else.

"Can't wait to meet her!" I say.

Without even noticing or me wanting to I switch right into idol mode.

"Oh man, you'll love her and on top of that she is a rather big fan of you."

"Oh! Really?" I giggle, "That's super exciting, I always like meeting my fans."

"Great, I guess I'll see you here then? I kind of promised to go meet up with her right now," he says.

I just nod and smile, building that wall to keep my own anguish and jealousy in check higher and higher. I nod at him and smile as brightly as I can.

"I'll see you there," I say cheerfully.

He gets up from his seat and practically at the same time the waitress arrives with my tea. Jun doesn't even take mind to this and quickly exits the shop. As soon as he is out the door tears start rolling down my face. I get mad at myself. Why are you crying stupid?! Why the hell are you crying?! This is all my damn fault, I got too damned focused on this stupid idol thing. I lost him for good now. Great job Mirai, no friends, no Jun. Was it all worth it? I can't blame anyone else, I really wish I could. I wish I could blame on someone the fact that I distanced myself from everybody and that I turned into this empty shell of a person. But I can't it's all me, I did all of this.

I take out my wallet and leave money over the table not even caring if I'm over or under paying. I exit the place quickly and sluggishly tread my way home.

* * *

**November/ 1****st**** / 2022**

"So…that new song we've been practicing these last few days," my lead guitar asks, "you really want to sing it today?"

"Yeah." I answer bluntly.

"Can I ask something?"

"Sure, why not?" I huff.

"Who is it for? It just…well it feels like it's for someone."

"A guy I knew," I reply.

"I see," he says, "kind of sad I guess."

"Yeah, whatever."

I hear heels tapping loudly against the floor, I sit on a small couch looking straight down at my feet. My back hurts a little but I don't care enough to change my position. Holding a water bottle between my legs I sigh as the sound of the heels against the floor gets closer.

"Kanada, you ready?"

"I am, Tokegawa," I reply, imitating her tone.

"Christ…" she sighs, "just be sure that your ass is on stage and smiling in five minutes."

I rest my back on the couch and lift my head, I never expected backstage to be this dark. It also feels kind of cramped. Thankfully everyone else is already on stage doing some quick instrument and speakers test. In the corner of my eye I notice Kyoko standing not far away from the couch, she holds a clipboard close to her, her expression seems to be full of worry and this really annoying hint of empathy.

"Are you ok?" she asks.

I just nod and stand up, feeling groggy. I stretch my arms up and hear my elbow crack, sending this pleasant release through my arm. I pat down my frilly outfit and pull up my thigh highs. Kyoko approaches me and makes sure everything on my chest is on its place she literally moves my boobs into place and makes sure my cleavage is noticeable but nothing that looks too slutty.

"Alrighty…now just to check your mic," she mutters, "just tap on the tip of it."

I raise my hand near my face and gently tap the tip of the mic that slightly pops out from the side of my cheek. The tapping makes a loud echo that comes from where the stage is and not even a second after that I hear loud cheering and people screaming. I smile for a second but then feel annoyed. I look up at Kyoko and see that she clearly noticed my expression.

"You are not ok, are you?"

I cover the mic with my hand.

"You do your work and I'll do mine, ok?" I reply and turn my back on her.

I position myself behind a set of speakers I can see the drummer, guitarist and everyone else on stage. I rub my forehead with my fingers and I'm about to sigh when I remember that my mic is already on. I contain it deep inside and just perk my head up. The guitarist just nods at me and I realize it's showtime. I open my eyes and smile widely before joyfully skipping into stage.

"Hello everyone!"

The band behind starts playing the main riff of a song on the set list tonight. I'm not supposed to sing yet it's just so my introduction is not completely silent. The crowd shakes me a little, it's a lot of people, more than I ever could've imagined. Only the first five rows of people are visible but it still sort of gives me this weird panic. I'm not one to have stage fright but this is all new to me. To my demise I quickly locate Jun and his girlfriend on the third row of people. I swallow my own spit and feel this caving sensation in my stomach.

"Let's get started then!" I shout gleefully. "One, two. One, two, three, four!"

The drummer quickly rolls off through each drum and the guitarist kicks in with a strong strum before I start to sing. The first song I like a lot, it's energetic and happy. It's the second song I wrote, it contains all my excitement and happiness of when I started working for Tokegawa. It's not like I lost this excitement and happiness it just decreased greatly. I love singing, I love dancing, I love seeing people enjoy my music. But it just hasn't been the same since all of this became work.

I go from side to side of the stage, dancing as I rehearsed and singing as loud as I'm able to. The people in the crowd have glow sticks and I can see them move up and down to the rhythm of the music. It's a fun thing to see just how on point the synchronization is. All of these feelings combined I suddenly find myself having more fun than I expected. I finish my first song and people cheer loudly as I strike a pose and the lights fade for a brief second before the next song starts.

The rest of the show goes rather well, no mishaps whatsoever except for the fact that I willingly tripped during one of the transitions just to sell Aeri's image. Everyone cheered even louder as I got up than when I finished each of the songs. It what feels less than an hour I find myself at the end of the set list.

"I have one last song, for you all!" I say.

The crowd goes wild again and from the backstage comes a man with an electric guitar, my guitar. He quickly helps the straps over me and I hold it gently with my hands. It brings me back, Jun gave me this guitar on birthday, shortly after I got hired by Tokegawa. I scan the audience quickly and see him. His mouth wide open, a kind of excited look on his face. So you do remember, huh?

"This last song I have today," I announce, "it's something that's been dwelling inside me for a while now."

I adjust my fingers on the right frets and breathe in deeply. Staring at the sea of glowing sticks and the visible faces close to the stage. I stare down one last time at the guitar, it's merely for show. I'm just going to play the first tiny bit of this song anyways. I nod at my guitarist and starts strumming. Nothing too fancy a short introduction to the tone of the song which is not exactly a happy one.

And then, I sing.

"Called to me far away, a girl much younger than the "me" of today

Dream it almost every night, and when I wake, still can't get away"

The other guitar joins me and with him enters the drummer, clashing the hi-hat at an even tempo.

"Sure, I know it's always said that every tear will help me face what's ahead

But I think that's all a lie and it'll tear you up instead"

With this I loosen the strap that secures the guitar around me and let it drop harshly to the ground. Sounds distorts loudly as it hits the ground but the sounds is quickly overpowered by everyone else starting the first verse of the song.

"Walking through the park at night, a dollar-twenty for a moment alone

Nervous and a little scared, it's just a habit I started, ya know"

I step forwards and make my way to the very edge of the stage.

"Makeup is all rubbed and gone, the real me is left in her place

Sure I wanted this disguise but is no one searching for this face?"

I take a deep breath.

"If you ever find forgiveness for a girl like me

Could I see your face just one last time? I beg you, please!

If I shine the brightest and become their northern star

Would you finally see me here or is it too hard?"

I smile for a brief second and continue.

"Grin and bear, almost there, I'll smile even if it's starting to wear

With this dream, I'll never let you down or lie to you, I swear

Can I dream, can I think that if you were to be by my side

Closing my mouth, you would scold me one more time

Please, tell me what is right"

Onto the second verse.

"Through the motions every day, I know it's work, no time here to daze

Will this ever be much fun? Is this the role that I'm suited to play?"

I turn to the crowd and purposely fix my gaze on Jun.

"Heavy from the wings they placed,

My back is aching from the burden it weighs

It's nothing like my wings from then, I'm draped in irony today"

His expression suddenly changes. I can just hope he realized it already.

"Soon the night encroaches eating everything I can see

Holding on, I pray to meet you even in my dreams

Shivering and shaking like a kid left in the dark

Could I maybe run to you and hide in your arms?"

His eyes are now completely fixed on me, that's all I ever wanted

"Sing it out, scream it loud, just let me shout through the pain and the doubt

For my dreams, I'll give my all again, don't let me fail now

Can I dream, can I think that if you were to be by my side

Closing my mouth, you would hold me near and sigh"

The song slows down a bit and again I center myself on stage.

"Then in the crowd was the root of it all

That dream repeated back, now rewound and paused

How could this-? I mean, are we meeting for real?

With this face, how should I look or feel?

Ripping through to grab my hand, shook just a bit and feelings ran

This can't really be the end, I won't believe it, don't leave me like this, ah"

I feel tears welling up in the corners of my eyes. Not now, not in front of everyone. I wipe my eyes quickly but more tears keep flowing. I notice the people on the front row stop moving their hands and bodies enthusiastically. I wipe my eyes again and breathe. I don't care I'm pulling through.

"Like I said…every time…my heart is breaking into pieces again

Tearing me up, breaking me down, all these feelings, I don't want them

Yeah, now I know we can never turn our clock back around

Though I know it…I'll…!"

I'm pulling through…

"Grin and bear, almost there, I'll smile even if it's hurting to wear

With our dream, I couldn't let you down or lie to you, I swear

Can I dream, can I think while I'm just so in love with you

That our paths, no, no matter what we choose

Won't divide us and leave me leaving you"

I drop to my knees and as the music starts to fade away I start sobbing. Not wanting anyone to hear I rip the mic from the side of my cheek and throw it away to the side. The lights without warning shut off and Kyoko comes running up on my side. She puts me back on my feet and hastily pulls me to the backstage.

"What the hell was that about, Kanada?!" Tokegawa asks.

Barely being able to gather myself and my thoughts I answer.

"Fuck off! Get off my back for a fucking second!"

With that annoyed look only she can give she stares at me with demeaning eyes. Hurried footsteps suddenly echo in the cramped area. Jun appears from around the corner with two security guys giving him chase. He is just a few feet away from when he is seized by two big men. He struggles to no avail and he just stares at me. He is doing that face, a face I haven't seen in the longest time. He looks worried about me he wants to be near me. It's annoying…it's so annoying now.

"Miss Watanabe this man claims to know you," says one of the security guys.

"Come on Mirai, let me talk to you, please," Jun pleads.

"Do you know this man, Miss Watanabe?"

I stare at Jun in the eye for a second or so but it feels like ages. Tears stop flowing and I just keep staring.

"I don't, I've never seen this guy in my life," I answer.

Jun just stares back, his eyes wide with shock. He even stops struggling. Security takes him away with ease and I drop to my knees again. I do not cry I just kneel there, Kyoko crouches next to me and places her hands on my shoulders.

"Surprising," Tokegawa mutters, "We'll see how your sales go from this little fit of yours, if I'm not impressed consider yourself terminated."

She takes her leave after dropping those harsh words on me. Kyoko stays for a bit longer, maybe like five minutes I don't care. Then she leaves as well. I get up and walk over to my bag, it's hanging from the side of a chair. As I get close I hear something is ringing inside. I open it and dig my hand inside, I pull out my phone and see Jun's name on the caller id. I cancel the call without answering and quickly go into my contacts to block his number. I sit on the chair and stare mindlessly at the bright screen of the phone. I guess being alone can't be that bad. I've been getting used to it anyways.

* * *

**November/ 6****th****/2022**

"So what are you going to do?"

I adjust my grip on my phone and tilt my head a little to the side.

"I'll just play some games, I don't really feel like going out," I answer.

"Ok, I'll be getting home late though, so don't wait up. Alright?"

"Yeah, I'll see you then sis."

"Take care silly, try to enjoy your day off."

I press the red button on the screen and lean back on my chair. The two monitors of my desktop computer shine brightly, it's kind of bothering my eyes now. The screen shows the progress bar of the new game I'm installing.

"Sword Art Online…" I mumble.

My phone vibrates in short bursts and I lift it up to see the callers id. I sigh as I do so and answer the call.

"What is it, Tokegawa?"

"Good day to you too Kanada," she says, "I got you a photo shoot tomorrow, just so you know. Kyoko will pick you up."

"Ok."

She stays silent and so do I.

"Alright…I'll see you tomorrow then," she says, sounding unsure.

"Yeah."

She hangs up before I do. I throw my phone at my bed and then run my fingers through my hair. I get up and grab the helmet sitting right at my pillows. It's nice and cold. I glance at the screen the see the progress bar. Just a bit longer. I put the helmet over my head and tightly secure the straps under my jaw. I lie down and turn my head slightly to the side so I can still check the progress bar. I see it fill up and then stare up at the ceiling.

"Link start…"

* * *

Crysina here!

Thank you to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

Now this is a lengthy chapter, huh? It had been a while since we had a backstory chapter and I had fun writing this. Aeri's backstory I had in mind for a long long while and then I came across this song called "Jonjuunana". This is the song that Aeri sings towards the end of the chapter. The song is sort of based of on the story of a member of AKB48, AKB48 being a rather famous idol group from Akihabara in Tokyo. Nevertheless the story is about a gril form the group who falls in love with a man. Being that AKB48 does not allow it's members to be in a relationship while they are part of the group she was forced to stop seeing this man to keep working as an idol. So as you can see there's a slight similarity with that story and Aeri's but I think it's not all that similar at since my idea for Aeri was a bit different to begin with. THE THING IS! Once I saw there was an English version of this song I just had to include it in the chapter. I asked a youtuber named "Jubyphonic" to let me use her lyrics in within a day she replied to me saying it was ok. SO go and check her cover of "Jonjuunana" please I think it will further improve your enjoyment of this chapter. Let's hope our dear Aeri can keep her lover around in the future. Too soon? Haha.

I would like to bestow upon **rfpaulino1987** the award to the one hundredth review to my story. This allows you to say you were the one hundredth review in my story. SO yeah totally a thing you can boast about to your family and friends only to be followed by the next sentence. "What?" Unto **ICO** now: Sinna will not only be there to look and do cute things, I like to think she will play a larger role in the future. I'm glad I delivered with her character and made people go "Dawwww". NOW I have to announce that on the next chapter you guys will finally get to see how everyone else is doing! I had to focus on Aeri this month to you know do the things with the character development and the writing stuff. Haha.

As always, if you like what you read or just feel like saying something about the story in general, please leave a review. I love reading what readers have to say about my story and enjoy even more to know if you guys are enjoying it or if there are ways for me to improve.

Take care and I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Arcadia"


	36. Chapter 36 - Arcadia

**Chapter 36.- Arcadia**

**September/ 18****th**** / 2023**

**Thirty Second Floor of Aincrad – Aldhurst Training Grounds**

**Alshep**

"Now you're just cheating!" I complain loudly.

"What, is Al too delicate for a punch in the face?" Owl says.

We keep circling each other in the small, circular arena. People are gathered on the edges watching us fight.

"We said weapons only," I huff.

"My bad, I guess," he replies.

"You smug bastard," I mutter.

I feint at him as if swinging my sword but quickly change my position as I approach him. I try to tackle Owl but he easily stops me from toppling him over. I stand awkwardly, sensing my fate as he drops his weapons and wraps his burly arms around my waist.

"Oh shit.." I mumble.

He lifts me with ease and piledrives me into the floor. I fall on my back and open my eyes just in time to see Owl trying to stab me with his spear. I roll away from his attack and stand up. I stumble back and manage to steady myself with the small wooden railing limiting the arena.

"Oh boy, you don't seem to be doing so well, sweetheart." Ruri says from the other side of the railing.

"Shut up," I reply.

"You're so cute when you're mean," she says.

"You never stop being awkward, huh?" I ask.

"Nope," she says with a smile, "Now go get him tiger."

She pushes me forwards practically at Owl's spear. I roll to the side and manage to get up close to him. Now I have the tactical advantage; spears are useless in close quarters.

I punch him with all the strength I can muster, which isn't much at the moment, and he staggers back, letting his spear and shield fall to the ground. We begin to throw punches at each other, my agility allowing me to evade his. He carelessly throws a punch to my stomach but I grab his arm. I pull him close to me and quickly push him over my leg, which I sneakily placed behind him, sending him crashing to the ground. A chime is heard and the duel comes to a close.

"You got lucky," Owl huffs.

"Sure, sure," I say and help him back on his feet.

He stands, stretching and brushing off dirt. People around the small arena start to leave and Ruri jumps over the railing to join us. She slow claps as she approaches us and then jumps on Owl's back. Owl is taken a little by surprise and almost trips over but he manages to just barely regain his balance.

"Such an elegant display of virility," she says.

"I know right? Could see you swooning from over here," I tease.

"I do not swoon!" she replies.

"Yeah that's too much physical activity for you," Owl pokes.

Ruri is well known for being lazy, so I just laugh a bit at Owl's comment. She pouts over Owl's shoulder but then she smiles and looks at me with those mischievous eyes of hers. She gently places her head next to Owl's and seductively traces her hand up Owl's neck.

"I don't know what you are talking about."

Owl just stands idly with a blank expression, I cross my arms and stare at the girl.

"After all," she moans, "I'm all for physical activity."

Owl pushes her off his back and starts walking to the edge of the arena. Ruri complains on the ground but quickly gets up.

"That was harsh."

"Really?" I ask.

"Yeah, like I was just kidding," she says.

She takes a few seconds to look past me and then brings her hand up to her chin. She chuckles to herself and smiles in a very dirty way.

"Although I wouldn't mind," she admits.

"I swear to god you have no filter on your thoughts," I say.

"What can I say? I'm an open book."

"You are an open porn mag," I reply.

"I've got love to share with everyone, what's the problem with that?" she complains.

We start walking out of the arena and I laugh a little.

"Ever think maybe you are oversharing?"

She gets close behind me and hugs me tightly. She wraps hers arms around my chest and presses her face against my back.

"Or maybe I don't share enough," she moans.

"Knock it off," I say and shake her off of me.

"Come on Al, don't limit yourself to just one woman," she purrs.

I stop hearing anything she has to say and catch up to Owl.

"That last bit was cheating, so you owe me a rematch," Owl says.

"Cheating? You were the one that started throwing punches," I answer.

"True…but still," he says and chuckles.

"I'm not giving you a rematch, now shut up," I say, "Let's go back already."

He speeds up and I decelerate accordingly, wary of matching his rhythm.

I mean, she's got a great rear, there's no denying that," Little Miss Pervert mumbles.

"Who?"

"Kayla, if only she weren't so mean," she complains.

"You are seriously the only one that manages to get on her bad side."

"Seriously what a bummer I really like her," she huffs.

"Well you should try being a bit more normal."

She gets ahead of me and turns around with a twirl.

"Listen here, mister," she explains, "it's no fun at all being normal. If I were normal, I'd be like Owl; we all would."

"What's wrong with Owl?"

"That big, burly, manly man is too quaint. He's nice, but he's so plain!"

She keeps walking backwards and turns around just in time to not trip over the steps that lead up to Aldhurst's gate.

"And what's not so normal about me?" I ask curiously.

She opens the gate's menu and scrolls down to floor seventeen. She turns slightly to me and presses her index finger against her lips.

"Hmm," she utters, "You I just like for no particular reason."

She disappears to the seventeenth floor and I'm left alone at the gate.

"What a great explanation," I mutter sarcastically.

I transport to Barrowdell and yawn quite loudly once I materialize on the floor. Ruri is already ahead, walking through the crowd. Despite the lack of players, the streets are still stuffed with people. I say people but I actually mean NPCs, they just feel very genuine from time to time. In all the time I've spent around here I can only say I've heard dialogue loop once.

"Hey, getting back just now?"

I look to my right only to see our smiling blacksmith greeting me.

"Hello to you too, Lisbeth," I huff, "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

I keep walking when I notice she is carrying a lot of stuff. Three swords, a hammer and a dagger to be precise.

"Your guild gives me a nice bit of business, besides not like a have a store for you guys to come and pick up your stuff."

"Let me help you with that," I say taking the hammer and a sword form her, "Why not just put it in your inventory though?"

"I like showing off my work to random strangers walking about," she says, her chest proudly puffed out.

"Fair enough."

I push the door to the guild house with my back and Esra is ready and at the door the second I come in.

"Welcome back Master," she says with a little bow, "How was training?"

"It went alright, who's in?"

"Owl is yet to arrive, Ruri is up in her room," she says, "Kayla is currently in the kitchen, and Elina and Twyla are still on the first floor with the new member."

"Twyla is training Hotoka?" I ask.

"It appears so, Elina was to go with her alone, but Twyla went along with her in the last moment."

"Al, uh…you need to let me in," Lisbeth says, sounding a bit irritated.

This has happened numerous times. I just can't seem to get accustomed to letting her in like this. A barely visible yellow grid prevents Lisbeth from coming into the guild house and opening my menu sends a notification up to my face. I click "Ok" promptly and she is now allowed to come into the building. Lisbeth walks to the table not far from the door and sets the rest of the weapons over it. I walk over as well and set the sword and hammer over the table's surface.

"I'll come back for my Col later, I'm a bit busy at the moment," she says, "You guys take care."

Esra politely opens the door for her and the pink haired blacksmith exits our guild house. I take off my armor and hang my head a little.

"Is something amiss, master?" Esra asks

"No, not really…" I mumble.

"I've been meaning to say…" she says softly.

"Yeah?"

She holds her hands together near her stomach and for the first time in a long while I see her appear nervous as she fidgets a bit.

"I found something…in Daath's room," she says.

"You what?" I miff.

I stand up and quickly close the distance between me and Esra. I stare down at her as she tries hard not to look me in the eye.

"I found this key…" she mumbles, "I'm sorry master I was just cleaning and I…and I… I thought."

With shaking hands she holds up this white key, it's kind of shiny and it has an emblem with horn on it. I take the key away from her and hear shriek as I do so.

"Master…I was just….I thought you might want to know about this key," she says, sounding apologetic, "I'm so sorry."

I clutch the key in my right hand and look at her, feeling enraged, like I'm about to burst.

"I told you not to go in there," I say.

"B…but I have to clean and als-"

"And what exactly are you going to do to this poor girl?"

I turn to the door and see a black hooded player resting her back on the door's frame. Knowing I have to let her inn I quickly go through the same process I went through with Lisbeth. She walks in and slowly uncovers her face.

"Argo…come on in…" I mumble.

"I asked you a question, guild leader," she mocks.

I grind my teeth and stare her right in the eye. Her gaze is just scary. I would joke it's the stare of a dead man, but she is a woman and she is very much alive. She reaches for my shirt and pulls me in closer to her face.

"…Yes?"

"Nothing, I'm not gonna do anything," I reply.

"Then don't scare her, christ…" she mutters and pushes me away.

Esra is terrified, she looks at me with teary eyes. I examine my posture and realize how aggressive I look.

"I'm sorry, Esra…" I say softly, "Please forgive me."

"Esra, could you leave for a moment? I need to talk to Al," Argo says.

"Of…of course," she responds shyly and goes away.

She quickly goes away to the kitchen and leaves me and Argo alone in the foyer. The whiskered woman stares at me, a cocktail of disappointment and empathy swirling in her eyes. I just shrug. There's really no way for me to explain it.

"I know it's still hard for you to accept," Argo says.

"Eavesdropping…how surprising...should it be easy?" I ask, well aware of my harsh tone.

As per usual, she gazes elsewhere, seemingly without a care in the world and yet her hunched shoulders betraying her inner turmoil. I approach her slowly, she is clearly hurting too but is trying to hide it. Reminds me of a certain girl I haven't seen in a while now.

"I know he was sort of close to you…" I mutter.

"Be that as it may…" she replies with a sigh, "I thought you were keeping it together, apparently I was wrong."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Come on Al, you still have his room there, right?" she says, "And from what I heard, you won't even let anyone see it."

I remain silent because if I outright admitted it, that would mean losing the argument, and right now I really need to win this, more than I wanted to win that stupid fight. She crosses her arms and hangs her head as she gives me that emotionless stare of hers.

"I bet you didn't give his girlfriend and that other guy the same amount of respect," she says.

"They had a choice!" I raise my voice, "Daath didn't! Daath didn't walk out on us because he wanted to!"

"Oh drop the act," Argo demands, "You still beg me to check if they are alive."

I clench my fist and refuse to look at Argo. She has a way of getting under my nerves.

"I lost as much of a friend as you did," she admits, "But come on man…you need to move on."

With absolutely perfect timing Twyla, Elina, and Hotoka come in through the door. Elina comes in with a smile, one that is quickly erased as she stares at the current situation. Twyla gets off Edelweiss' back and with a cherry smiles starts approaching me.

"Yoh, guild leader, I think we ar-"

Covering her mouth quickly, Hotoka silences Tryla and awkwardly pushes her to the stairs. I nod at Hotoka for her respectful understanding and she makes haste up the stairs, probably heading to her room.

"You need to clear that room, holding on to it won't do you guys any good," Argo says and slowly heads for the stairs.

I reluctantly follow her without saying a word. My whole body rejects the idea but either way I sluggishly follow the whiskered information broker. As I take my first step on the stairs I briefly glance back and see Elina holding her hands close to her chest. She is trying to give me a comforting look, but I wish it did more than just make me smile a little.

Making it to the first landing I follow Argo down the hallway. I get ahead of her and position myself next to Daath's old room. Turning the knob feels wrong, I can't explain why. I sigh deeply before stepping through the door's frame. I haven't stepped in here since it happened.

"They…they left some stuff behind," I mumble, "Both him and Aeri."

I walk over to the small chest resting at the bed's feet. I crouch quickly and open it. A black cloak, a pair of swords, some potions and a silver dagger.

"Most of it is just trash I guess…" I add.

"What about that key?"

I get all of the stuff inside the chest in my inventory and stand up. I dig into my pockets and take out the white key.

"This?"

"Yeah."

She stares at every ridge and bump on the key, curiously feeling its cold surface. The only thing she doesn't do with the key is lick it. Every inch of the tiny object is examined by her cunning eyes.

"I think I've seen this before, but not from Daath," she exclaims, "He never told showed me this, I'm sure I've seen it from another player though."

"Really?"

"Can I get back to you on this? I think it's part of a very rare quest."

"Sure…I don't really care," I reply.

I look around the room for a few seconds. In retrospect it feels a bit dumb that I held unto this. I can't even come with a good reason as to why I did. I guess it just didn't feel right, it felt too soon even if more than three months have come and gone. He left us, but not willingly and I guess we just haven't had the strength to push through this damn mess.

"I guess I just wanted to hold onto something," I admit.

She crosses her arms again and nods at me with this understanding look.

"I mean, we've been managing along quite alright so far," I huff, "We've had new members, they've come and gone. Most left, but at least they joined in the first place. We are surviving."

I chuckle to myself for no real reason.

"But you know, that's exactly what sucks," I pause, "We've only been surviving. I want it to do so much more. I should be happy, but all I can think about is Klaus running free."

"And what would you even do?"

"Huh?" I question, "What do you mean?"

"Say I know where Klaus is, which I really don't as of now, but what if I did?"

"Easy," I say and cross my arms, "I would go and kill him."

She laughs a little, even throwing her head back as she does.

"Awesome, then you would be no better than him," she says, sarcastically.

Oh you poor whiskered girl. I laugh loudly, clearly losing it. That has got to be the greatest line of bullshit I've heard in my life.

"Oh, that's rich. That's just fucking rich," I laugh, "Get your head out of your ass!"

She looks a bit taken by my sentence. Why wouldn't she? I just told her to get her head out of her ass.

"Klaus killed Daath, he killed Kato, he tried to kill Elina, he tried to kill me, and he has killed way too many players now," I say and point my finger right at her face, "Trust me the last thing I will show that red headed fucker is mercy."

"So you'll get down to his level?"

"Oh excuse me, what the hell should I do then?" I ask, "Let him go around as he is probably still hunting us? To let him roam this world as he kills other people as well? What exactly do you want from me, Argo?"

"You should forget about him, best case scenario he already forgot about you," she mutters.

"So I should let my guard down?"

"No, never do that!" she exclaims, "but…please Al, don't let this feeling consume you."

Is she worried about me? I feel suddenly guilty about raising my voice at someone so well meaning. I want to look down or away but I just stare at this sudden expression of worry. It feels nice to know that even the All-knowing Argo is worried about me.

"Shit…" I huff, "I'm sorry."

"I have a feeling you've been saying that too often," she teases.

"I take back."

"I was kidding," she says with a soft chuckle, "But seriously…you are better than that."

"People keep saying stuff like that," I say in disbelief.

She walks towards the door and steps through the threshold.

"Maybe that's because it's true."

She's almost out of my sight when I suddenly bound forward.

"Argo," I say.

She stops and turns her head towards me once again.

"How…how are they doing?"

"They are doing well, last time I saw them they were a few floors up," she says but sighs, "I won't tell you where they are though, I'm just trying to res-"

"Respect Aeri's decision…yeah." I interrupt, "Thanks, Argo."

"You take care, ok?" she says.

I just nod, I feel the need to sit down and take a sit over the chest. I can hear Argo slowly walking away as her boots step on the hardwood floor. It takes a few seconds but after a bit I hear the front door close.

"Master? Are you alright?"

I raise my head up a bit and see Esra standing by the door. I smile for a second and then stand up.

"Hey, I'm really sorry about before," I say.

"No need to worry, I did something I shouldn't have," she replies.

"Come on, don't say it like that…" I mumble, "Just…well, I'm sorry either way."

She smiles brightly to me and then makes a little bow in front of me.

"I will be taking my leave then," she says.

I nod and see her walk towards the stairs.

"My my, taking two other girls into an empty room and poor little Elina wasn't even there to watch. Even worse, you don't even invite me."

"Shut up Ruri," I say.

"Bah, come on you know I'm kidding," she says.

I turn around and lean my back on the door's frame. I cross my arms and stare at the white haired pervert. Unamused and raising an eyebrow I make damn sure she knows I don't believe her last sentence.

"Ok, you know I'm kidding…most of the time," she corrects herself.

Still I keep the same pose and expression locked down on her.

"Ok, fine whatever," she admits.

She crosses her arms as well and tries to look at something to distract herself with. Her gaze darts around the hallway but ends up focusing on Daath's room.

"You know, after all this time," she says, "You would expect to just be able to forget…you know? At the very least forget."

I avoid doing any comments, I just nod and slowly sigh myself. I suddenly smile though, why should I remember the guy this miserably?

"Hey, you want this room?" I ask.

"Uhm…for real?"

"Yeah, it's about time we clear this thing up, anyways."

"Well, sure I'll move here," she says, "You sure?"

I nod and start heading for the stairs. Daath maybe did die like a dog, but he did a ton of great things before leaving us prematurely. I extended my grieving process too many months. I'm done with it. I go down the stairs. Elina, Kayla and Twyla are sharing some food, Esra is just standing next to the table as she joins in the conversation from time to time. The world didn't stop. It didn't stop at all, it seems I have been the only one stuck in those events, those months ago. The girls laugh at something they are talking about as I reach the door to the guild house. I turn around as I place my hand on the knob and see Hotoka leaning over the handrail of the second floor.

"Hey Hotoka, get down here," I say.

"Huh, what for?" she complains.

She hangs her head in a really dramatic fashion and sighs so loudly even everyone at the table turns to see her.

"Don't tell me we are going out, I'm already on my pajamas," Hotoka whines.

"What? It's like two in the afternoon," I huff, "And you are not even wearing pajamas!"

Bright light envelopes Hotoka's body turning her light armor into a set of pink pajamas. With a blank expression I stare at her and cross my arms. She rolls her eyes and through her menu she equips again her light armor. She sighs again and jumps over the handrail, she gracefully falls on the entrance floor and starts walking towards me.

"We are going training."

"What? But we just got back from training," Hotoka says.

"Have you done any duel training?" I say with a grin.

* * *

**First Floor of Aincrad – Starting City**

"Don't you think you were a bit rough?" ELina asks.

I laugh and scratch the back of my head as we make it out of the main plaza.

"Really? I actually think I was a little too soft on her."

"You beat the sh-poop out of her," Elina stammers.

"Woah, language," I tease.

"Oh shush, if anything being with you is rubbing off on me."

"I'll take that as a compliment," I say.

"Of course you will, silly."

We walk through some narrow streets an odd feeling of nostalgia starts taking over. At the beginning we didn't stay long at all in starting city, but these streets in particular are very much burned into my mind. I guess in a way people would say it's because of trauma, but it really isn't, or at least I think so.

"Are you sure about this?" Elina asks, as we go down the empty street.

"Yeah, it's long overdue anyways, besides you never said goodbye did you?"

"True…" she mutters.

This city…I don't know if every time we come it looks better or worse. Every time it just looks that more empty, which makes it look clean but then again, it just feels empty. We reach yet another familiar structure, a building with a long darkened entrance. I gently take hold of Elina's hand start heading in. The more we walk the more that slab of names becomes clear to see. The hall itself is as dark as the last time I was here. It is also very cold now.

"Uhm…so…uh what exactly are we doing?" Elina questions.

"I'm not sure myself."

Standing just a few feet away from the slab now, we stop and just stare at the thing. I notice an odd plushy near the middle of the slab, the toy just sits there. I wonder if someone forgot about it, or maybe it's just some in-game thing I never noticed before. I hear Elina clap her hands and turning my head I notice she is keeping them together with her eyes closed.

"Huh…never took you for a religious person," I comment.

She opens one eye and suddenly looks embarrassed.

"I…I'm not I just thought…uh you know? A prayer or something would be nice."

"It can't hurt," I reassure her.

I clap my hands as well and stand straight. I keep my hands together and close my eyes as I do my best attempt at this prayer thing, which if I'm honest, I have just never done in my life. Halfway through whatever I thought I was doing I start to chuckle.

"Geez, what is it?" Elina asks.

"I just remembered," I stop myself to laugh a little, "Remember how we had this thing we did so we always had a lamp whenever we quested late?"

I start all out laughing quite loudly and even bend a little as I do.

"And you always found a way to forget the lamp?" I add.

Elina chortles and starts laughing as well.

"And do you remember what a grumpy guy you were?"

"Hey hey, that's still one of my main selling points," I joke.

She comes close and hugs me and I gently hug her back.

"It's been a while now, huh?" I mutter.

"Almost a year," Elina replies.

I scan the slab for Daath's name, relishing this moment. I find it easily and a smile crawls over my face.

"Thanks for saving us back then, man," I say.

Elina hugs me tighter.

"Thank you, Daath," Elina says as well.

Eventually, we have to realize something: the story we shared, all the pain and happiness...it wasn't all for nothing. We owe Daath a great deal of things, we will take that chance he gave us. Sadly his chance is over now, but here, today, we live in his stead. And you never know, maybe, just maybe we'll meet again someday.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thank you to mangachiaki for beta-reading!

Hello and good morning if you are ready this in the morning that is, if not then good [period of time in the day]. So this week we finally got to see the old gang, they seem to be faring ok no? People grieve differently and they all take different amounts of time. Anyways, this all has been happening and happened over a somewhat big time skip in my story, I'm sure you've notice. I usually think time skips and the such are mayor bullshit things to avoid writing stuff you don't want to. AND IT TOTALLY IS! Although I would like to excuse my time skip as a way to avoid writing boring stuff and to give way to character development. So is that ok? I think it is haha. Anyways, as you may also know the character cast just seems to be growing by the chapter and I fear some characters might not get as enough attention as others, but I do try to balance that out in further chapters. You'll be the judge I guess, but in a story with so many characters I think at time is inevitable to just put some characters in background. Enough about this.

**IC0 with a zero**: Rising idols in Japan while some may have dedicated fan-bases tend to be rather...uh small? When it comes to actual popularity. There are tons trying for the showbiz, and everyone wants a part of it. I'll be honest the first draft of that chapter had a small scene where a fan recognized Aeri and she was just thoroughly annoyed by it since she wanted to be alone. But it further expanded an already long chapter and I felt it didn't really add anything to the story. I really enjoy reading your reviews thank you for that critical eye of yours. **BeastZoroak**: You'll be surprised to know that from other drafts of the chapter this was technically the softer way I had planned for Aeri to reject him. **Steve**:Action will come soon I promise.

As always, if you like what you read, want to share a though on the story or anything of the sort, please leave a review. I enjoy reading what any of you guys has to say about my story!

Take care, and I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Keeping Up With The Act"


	37. Chapter 37 - Keeping Up With The Act

**Chapter 37.- Keeping Up With The Act**

**September/22th/2023**

**Thirty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Mishe**

**Kayla**

I'm fucking sick and tired of this shit. How much longer am I gonna keep this bullshit up? Day in and day out, pretending…I think I'm starting to lose it.

"Kayla?"

It's almost been a year. It's almost been a year and I can't take this anymore.

"…Kayla…?"

What's even been happening back there? In what freaking hospital am I even at? Who is covering the expenses? The thought of the woman whom I blatantly refuse to call 'mother' comes to mind and I feel the sudden urge to hit something. I don't even hate her; there's just something about her that's too...something. I can't think straight today.

"Kay-"

"What the hell do you want?!" I scream.

I wince and am silent, avoiding strangers' glares as they walk past. Today is just not my day.

"Are you alright?" Owl asks, with that annoyingly calm tone of his.

Beside me, Eli stares, befuddled. I have nothing against her; on the contrary, she's like the little sister I never had.

"Yeah, I-I'm alright," I answer, my voice quavering slightly.

"Sure?" Owl prods.

"Yeah, honest," I say.

He crosses his arms and stares at me with those big dumb eyes.

"Are you really sure?"

"Yes! God dammit!" I scream.

Owl stares at me as if assessing my flaws. Without realizing, I clutch at my hair, flustered and aggravated. I see Elina approaching me, mouthing things that I can't even hear. It sounds muffled, kind of far away.

"What?" I mumble.

She steps closer, worried. Slowly she lifts her hand up and tries to reach out for me. Her hand finally reaches me and she takes hold of my arm. I feel electric as she does so and I pull my arm away violently taking a few steps back.

"I..uh.." I stammer.

Owl and Elina seem uncertain, but there's something else there as well. Their stare is almost painful, as if they were staring at some kind of freak they feel pity for. Is this it? Is this my breaking point? They keep talking but I just can't make out a word of what they are saying.

"I have to go…I have to go!" I say and turn around.

At first I start stumbling, tripping over my own feet down the street I regain my balance, sprinting as fast as my legs will let me. I have to escape from these people, all these fucking people, the streets that cage me and their residents. I'm heaving, barely catching any breath. I turn right and left as the streets come to an end looking for an exit. Finally I find it, a street that winds down to a dirt road. Still running at full speed the change between the cobblestone streets to the muddy ground makes me lose my balance and I fall face first into the mud.

"Fuck…fuck…"

I press my hands on the mud and push myself up a bit. I get on my knees and slowly move back until I'm sitting on the cold, muddy ground. Lightning crosses the sky and with it comes a slow trickle of rain. I look up at the sky and feel the tiny drops of rain fall on my face. I chuckle not knowing really why, using my hands to support myself I get up and start walking down the road.

"What a lovely day…" I mumble.

Vast plains extend before me, with nothing but farming plots and a scattering of houses for as far as I can see. I can feel mud, through my clothes and on my skin. I pay no mind to it as I bring up my menu. With a few actions on it I dismiss myself from the party and keep walking. My feet are now making that squishy sound as the dirt get wetter with every drop of rain that falls on it.

What the hell even happened? What triggered this? I've had some lash outs before but it never been this bad. I rub my hands together trying to rid the mud off of them. I fail to do so, simply smearing it instead. I bring up my inventory and scroll through it to find a handkerchief, keeping this princess like persona does come in handy I guess. The pure, white piece of cloth appears in my hand and I proceed to taint it with my filth. Once I finish just cleaning my hands the handkerchief is dirty beyond recognition. I bring the already dirty modesty up to my face and try to clean whatever I can. I pull it away to look at it and see that it's the same as when I finished cleaning my hands. There's a nearby boulder, not too far away from where I'm standing. Dragging my feet I make it to the boulder and sit on the ground, where there's actually some grass. I lean my back on the rock and look up as the rain keeps falling on my face. Finally alone with my thoughts my ears start paying attention to something else. The music, the floor's field music. It's a piano, slow and calm. Some people would say it sounds sad but it's very relaxing. As if synchronized with the falling rain the piano keys sounds off at a very slow tempo. I come across an item I haven't taken out in almost a year now. The mirror, the damned pocket mirror.

The small item is now in my hand, at first I tilt it away, refusing to stare into it. I can barely see its reflective side, it shows the clouds as little droplets form over it from the falling rain. Swallowing my own spit I tilt it again, this time to face me. Tied up blonde hair, a dirty face, big blue eyes. It's me, yet I don't recognize myself. I untie my hair and let it fall down to my shoulders, a little past them actually. Now that's more like it, this dirty, unkempt look is more like I always looked like. No matter how much I feel a princess, I will always be a dirty looking peasant.

"You are going to catch a cold."

I focus my eyes past the small mirror and see Ruri, standing but a few feet away from me.

"We can't even get sick…" I mumble.

"But you are still gonna be wet, and trust me I would prefer it if that was my fault," she says.

"Why are you always fucking blabbering the most perverted shit?" I reply.

"I'm sorry," she says softly, "Are you ok?"

"No."

"What's wrong then?" she asks.

"I…I don't know how to…uhm…" I mumble, "Who am I, Ruri?"

"I don't know."

"Heh…thanks for nothing…" I say.

"I know Kayla," she says, "And you know Ruri, but I don't know who you really are."

"Huh?"

"No one is really being themselves here, maybe it's for right, maybe for wrong," she explains, "But no one here is really being who they are in the real world."

When did this perverted girl ever start making sense? Her words are all true, so much so that it pisses me off a bit. I bite my lip and bend my legs to hold them close. I wrap my arms around them and try to hide my face.

"So, who are you then?" Ruri asks.

"I…I'm not sure anymore," I reply.

"Oh come on, of course you know," she says.

I peek at her but cover my face again rather quickly. I breathe out loudly, making sure to make it sound like I'm annoyed, because I really am.

"I know who I am, logically you know who you are," she says, "I'm Ran, Matsuda Ran."

"Ran?" I say, laughing just for a short second.

"Yeah, it's not exactly a pretty name is it?" she says and chuckles.

"I'm uh I apologize, I did not mean to mock you," I say.

"Of course you did, my name is dumb," she says, "You need to stop being so formal, geez."

"Well shit, I'm sorry then."

"There we go," she teases.

"So, Ran," I mumble, "Asides from that, what are you like in the real world?"

"Oh, girl, I'm plain as hell," she says, "Most boring person you'll ever meet."

"Really now?"

"Nah I kid, I'm practically the same, just not as outspoken because of my parents."

"What do you mean?" I say, relaxing my legs and turning my head to her.

"My parents are super uptight, and annoyingly traditional," she says, "Do you really think some guys that run a traditional inn in the middle of nowhere would really be ok with someone like me?"

I suddenly feel a tad bit uncomfortable and I'm very nervous about the words that are about to come out of my mouth.

"You mean like how you like…uh I mean," I cough out of just feeling uncomfortable, "How you like..uhm you know…"

"How I like girls as well?"

I start coughing a bit loudly, took me by surprise.

"Nah they don't know, I live with my aunt, she does know though," she says, "I went to live with my aunt when I turned twelve. I couldn't stand living in that claustrophobic town."

I find myself very interested in all of Ruri's words, I guess it has something to do with the fact that it has been ages since I last heard about someone's life. She notices me just right down staring with curious eyes and I see her smile.

"My aunt is nicer than my parents and hell, living in Tokyo is way better than living in the country," she says.

"I actually liked living in the country when I was little," I say softly.

"I would've never guessed you used to live in the country," she says with surprise.

"Long time ago, with my parents," I huff.

"Right, right," she mumbles, "So…uh are you like American or something like that?"

"Huh?"

"Oh come on you are going to tell me now you are Japanese?" she yaps, "Your features just look a little mixed, I wouldn't say you are Japanese."

"I am Japanese," I mumble, "My dad wasn't though, and he married my mom who was Japanese."

"Was?"

"Yeah, they passed away," I confess.

"Oh, uh…I'm sorry."

The details are far more interesting in theory but I'm nowhere near the mood to be ok with discussing them.

"So, do you live alone?" Ruri asks.

"Nope, a really close friend of my mother takes care of me," I say, as I start to remember that woman I've always been nothing but mean to, "She always wanted a child…she couldn't have one. So she took me in because my mother didn't have any family left."

I'm already rambling and for some reason I don't feel like shutting myself up.

"She later had a child, literally a few months after she uh…"adopted" me," I chuckle, "A bit ironic I guess or something…"

I sigh and look up at the sky.

"So you have a sibling?"

"Yeah…yeah I do," I say, "A little brother…I…I love him very much."

A soft cry escapes my lips and I widen my eyes in surprise as I feel them starting to tear up. I want to laugh as well, I couldn't believe my words, I couldn't believe the way my body is expressing these feelings. I want to see my little brother, I want to see that woman that has always called me her daughter…I want to see my mom.

Ruri moves closer to me, placing herself close next to me and gently embraces me from the side. I don't start wailing but I whimper and breathe loudly like a neglected dog. I push myself closer to Ruri, losing any sense of both mine and her personal space I hug her and bury my face in her chest. She strokes my back with her hand and with her other just gently holds my head in place.

"There, there," she mutters.

I hold her close, relishing the feeling of warmth emanating from her body.

"Anything else you want to say?" Ruri asks.

"Nagata Sumiko," I say, "My name is Sumiko."

Ruri chuckles.

"Sumiko?"

I stop hugging her and punch her arm.

"Ouchie," she playfully complains.

"You idiot," I say.

She smiles and hugs me again. Something in the back of my head makes me want to push her away but at the same time I find myself really enjoying her soft embrace. Slowly I hug her back and feel how little by little I start breathing easily.

"And what's Sumiko like?" Ruri asks.

"A total bitch," I reply.

"I had a feeling you weren't all nice and gentle," she says.

"Hah…well you would know, no?"

She extends her hand towards me and I find myself staring at her face as a gentle smile appears over it. I smile with the corner of my mouth but quickly take her hand and get up from the wet ground.

"You aren't all that bad, trust me," she says, again that sweet, gentle smile crawls over her face.

I swallow my own spit. How come she is not coming off as annoying anymore? Rather than anything else, her presence is soothing, which worries me slightly. I clear my throat out of sheer awkwardness and very slowly start walking back to Mishe.

"What makes you say that though?" I ask wearily.

"Well!" she shouts and starts walking next to me, "You can pretend to be a lot of things Su. Mi. Ko. But! I've seen some of your true colors slip through even through this mask of yours. You are gentle, sweet, and caring, even if you don't realize it or accept it."

"But-"

"I mean of course, you probably do need to swear, kick and scream from time to time, but I've seen how you care for everyone else," she says, "And that's genuine…or you know, I would like to think so."

I feel my cheeks get a bit rosy and try to hide them with my hands, to no avail. To think this girl could actually have things like this to say. I turn to her for a brief second and again see that warm expression, that faint curve on her lips, her odd…beautiful eyes staring right through me.

"Uhh…I well yeah but…" I stammer, going nowhere with my words.

"Honestly, I can't imagine that all your kindness is just a lie or façade," she says, "Even if we almost never see eye to eye, I…like you, you know?"

I take hold of both of her shoulders and turn her around in the middle of the rain to look at me.

"Why do you keep saying that?" I question.

She stares at me dumbfounded, tilting her head like a confused little animal that doesn't know what's going on. But she is playing dumb, she is playing with me, she's always been.

"What do you mean?" she ponders.

"Why do you always say you like me? Why? Why do you joke with things like saying that you love me?!" I howl, "How can you love this mess?"

"Because I'm not joking," she says.

My hold on her shoulder just tightens. She brings her hands up to mine on her shoulders and gently places her palms over my clutching hands.

"I know I'm always saying these, random, inappropriate things, hell I'm quite sure you are not even into me, or girls for that matter…" she says, almost sounding like she is sulking, "But my feelings are real."

I stay silent, my hands still grabbing her shoulders. My brain is some kind of short circuit. My eyes are solely fixated on her though, in her eyes. I feel like they are trapping me, pulling me in closer, little by little. I am moving, closing the distance, inch by inch I get closer to her, as I do so my grip just gets tighter on her and I fear I might hurt her. She doesn't back away, flinch or show any signs of wanting to escape.

She starts to move closer as well, she closes her eyes, perks up her lips a little and I'm already past the point where I'm not thinking anymore. But just as I'm getting ever closer with my hand I grab her jaw and with my other hand I pinch her cheek.

"Ow Ow," she complains.

"I don't know what I'm doing…" I say.

What the fuck was that? Why did I even do this, I was going in for it. Why did I stop it in such a dumb way? More importantly why was I going for it? Ruri is now looking at me again, I keep pulling on her cheek and just down right feel like digging a hole in the ground all to myself.

"Why are you doing this?" she mumbles through my pinching.

"I'm not sure…you make me feel so damn confused…" I utter.

"Is it the good kind of confused?"

"Shut up…I don't know."

"Let's go back to the house," I say and let go of her face.

"Ooh, already?" she asks tainting those two simple words with a lewd tone.

"Ah! Shut up, let's just go," I yell and grab her hand to pull her along with me.

Rain is still pouring down, it seems to be lightening up but it is still more than enough to drench all of my clothes. That piano still slowly trails off in the background. I feel so much better now but the feelings of anxiety and heaviness are now replaced with a strong confusion and me feeling lightheaded.

"Kayla?"

"What?"

"We are going to wrong way," she says with a giggle.

"I knew that," I say as I turn around.

* * *

**Thirty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Mishe - Wheathercock Pavilion**

"So…what are we going to do about this?" she teases.

"About what?"

"You know about this deal of me making you feel confused," she hums.

"Shut up already," I complain.

Not even sure if I'm hungry I just poke and prod my cheesecake with the fork in my hand. I'm such a mess. Things in that dumb rock got out of hand, I'm not exactly sure how to feel anymore. I feel like I'm drunk, but with what? I've been drunk, but this is a feeling that's wholly unfamiliar, and unsettlingly so. What is it? I'm rambling again.

Aimlessly I keep prodding my slice of cake, just trying to avoid Ruri in a way. Owl and Elina already sent me messages to see if I'm alright but the only one that stuck around is Ruri. I feel a comforting warmth and look at the table to see Ruri's hand covering mine.

"Kayla…I swear to you, what I said is real."

"Oh come on, for all I know you might as well be joking," I say.

She gives me a very sour frown and looks down at her hands that are over the table. She sighs very deeply and then just leans back on her chair. Could it be? Does she really feel that way about me? My hearts starts beating strongly and I feel my cheeks get warmer by the second.

"I…well…come on, how do you expect me to trust you?" I mumble.

"Alright, let's get someone else to judge," she says.

"What?"

Ruri quickly turns around, scanning the small bistro she grabs a poor bystander that was just on her way to the door of the place.

"Pardon me, I need you to verify the authenticity of what I'm about to say; would you mind?"

"Wh…what?" says the brown haired girl with twin tails.

Out of nowhere a small blue dragon flies and lands on top of her head. The cute little thing growls at us and then proceeds to leisurely rest its head on top of the poor girl. Ruri practically forces the girl to sit on the chair next to her and the poor girl just goes with it.

"What's your name?" Ruri asks.

"Uhh…ahhh..Si…Silica!"

"Right, Silica please tell me what you think of the following," Ruri demands.

"What are you trying to prove?" I say, really starting to get annoyed, "Just drop it alright?"

Ruri leans forward and takes hold of both of my hands. She pulls me a bit as she sits back down, this makes me bend over a little over the table. Once again I find myself staring at her beautiful eyes. What now?

"I know, I don't always say the right stuff…or for that matter anything appropriate, but one thing that comes out of my mouth is true," she says and takes a deep breath, "I…whenever I see you or whenever we talk, however short the moment may be, I can honestly say my heart skips a beat."

I feel my cheeks blush, and want to raise my hands to cover them but Ruri is holding them tight. I struggle a bit but she keeps them in place leaving me with no option but to keep staring at her.

"I mean…hell, you are pretty hot," she coughs and then clears her throat, "But what I know from Kayla is that even if some of it is an act, she is caring, warm, and sweet. Even if you haven't been true to yourself…to who you really are…I like you. I like you enough to say all this dumb stuff whenever I'm near you, enough to track you down when the others told me you weren't acting alright, enough to pull down a stranger to hear me say this and assure you that what I say is real."

"You're serious?" I mutter, the incredulity leaving my tone.

"I am, Kayla…even knowing that the chances for you to feel the same are slim to none…I just want to say one more thing."

She stops and pulls my hands a bit closer to her, she shakes a little even. Holy shit…is she nervous? Is this really for real? Part of me can't believe and the other part is blushing like an idiot, unable to stare somewhere else that's not her eyes.

"I love you."

Ruri let's go off my hands and turns her head to the poor brown haired girl she forced to sit down. Breaking me off that alluring trance of her pretty eyes I shake my head quickly and place my palms on my cheeks.

"So, Silica, what do you think?"

I also turn my gaze to the girl and see quite the funny image. She is blushing even harder than me. She fans her hands and herself quickly and with shaking eyes and a quivering voice answers.

"Th…tha…that's a pretty nice thing to say to your…your friend," Silica says, "You must really like her,"

"Yeah, I love her," Ruri repeats.

"Oh geez, I thought I heard that wr…wrong for a second," Silica replies, "So…so..so you two, girls, you two?"

Ruri just nods and the poor girl practically blows a fuse as she falls back on her chair. The blue dragon flies just in time and starts growling and whimpering on top of Silica.

"Well…how's that for genuine?" Ruri says with a smile.

My head is a mess of words, feelings and the right way to react to this isn't anywhere to be found in there. I get up slowly and stumble to the door. I open it and go into the fresher feeling street.

"Kayla!" Ruri comes out yelling.

She is clearly behind me, but I just stop on my tracks and keep my back pointed at her.

"You know, this is bullshit, this thing you are trying to pull," I say, a bit unnerved, "I let you in, and now you decide to tell me you love me and all this other crap. It's not fair."

"It's not crap," she mumbles.

I turn around furiously, with my fists clenched I just angrily make shake them at the floor.

"Oh come on, how do you want me to beli-"

Her face is all too close too soon to mine and she starts kissing me softly. I lift my hands in the air, like if I was getting mugged or something. What the hell is she doing and why does it feel nice?

"Mmhh Sto-…stop," I mumble between the short time she gives me to breathe.

She backs away slowly, her cheeks slightly rosy and her eyes with what I can only describe as an annoying hint of passion. I just touch my lips and look at my own feet.

"How's that for genuine?"

"Oh shut…" I mumble but then look up at her, "it…it felt nice."

She gets closer with that smug grin that only she and Al can do.

"There's more where that came from," she says and tries to go in for more.

I stop her by putting my hand in between my lips and hers, and then kind of savagely pushing her face away from mine.

"Listen now, you pervert," I say sternfully, "If we are doing anything, we are doing it at my pace, alright?"

Her eyes spark up as I say this and she lunges herself at me to hug me. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't even know if I want this. A relationship with another girl? What would people say? The world is pretty liberal as of late but I never saw myself in this kind of position.

"Yes, I can do slow, I can definitely do slow!"

In the middle of the street I awkwardly stand with Ruri clinging for me. My body swaying from side to side with her. I look up at the sky and feeling confused and kind of happy, I just let out a long sigh. What the hell am I doing?

"It can't be that bad…"

"What?" Ruri asks.

"Nothing."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thank you to mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

Hiya! I think I'm a bit late in updating this, I mean yes it still is Sunday but I regularly have a stricter upload schedule that being 11AM my time. Either way, so finally another chapter about Kayla. As most of you may know, Kayla is way different on SAO compared to how she is in real life. She's been living with this made up persona of hers for almost a year now, and that takes it's toll on people but thankfully fan-favorite girl Ruri was there! Anyways, I apologize for the length on this one it isn't exactly short but it is one of the shorter chapters I've done lately. Also I didn't even realize it but I'm well over the 7k views mark YAY! You guys are cool.

**IC0**: More Ruri! And a little surprise, Ruri chapter will come soon! Also I swear action is coming. **Devilparrot**: I'm flattered to be deemed in such high airs. I am very sorry but Daath is not coming back. **BeastZoroark**: I'm really super glad Ruri seems to be liked by everyone. **rfpaulino**: ONWARDS! **Commando2341**: The worse is yet to come, I mean what.

As always if you like what you read, want to give me some constructive criticism or whatever that you have in your pretty head, please leave a review. I enjoy reading what you guys say and I like interacting with my readers like I do i these ANs.

You all take care and I'll see you all next week! See ya!

Next Chapter: "The Blight of The Living"


	38. Chapter 38 - The Blight of The Living

**Chapter 38.- The Blight of The Living**

**September/30th/2023**

**Forty Second Floor of Aincrad – Mishe**

**Alshep**

Sand, heat, and all things neat. Add this up and you get the nice result of uncomfortable weather and disgusting terrain to trek through. You get sweaty, you slip, and most annoyingly sand gets inside your freaking boots.

"It's not far from here," Argo says, "Or so the manuscript said…"

"For an information broker you more often than not come off flaky," I huff.

"Give whiskers a break, she's been helping us out all this time," Ruri butts in.

"Don't you have better things to do, Ruri?" I ask, "I don't know, something like trying really hard to get Kayla to sleep in your room?"

"Well, for one I'm glad someone recognizes how hard I've been trying, and second," she says while raising her finger to her chin, seconds later she just pouts "I've been trying like so super hard, ok?"

I laugh at her whiny face and almost stumble once I start moving forward again. Argo chortles and gets that hood of hers out of her face. She's always wearing the same thing; to be honest, I don't think I've ever seen what's underneath her cloak. Argo is definitely someone that keeps to herself I think. It's only gotten worse lately, since her original contact was with Daath and without him it's hard to know if she's here because she wants to be or out of respect for Daath. But maybe, just maybe, she just cares about us, and I care for her as...a friend.

"So is it really worth it?" I ask.

I look down at my closed hand. The shiny white key glimmers slightly in the sunlight.

"Whatever this is, it's got to be huge, the item only has one other copy," Argo explains, "Only two of these keys exist in all of SAO Al."

"That tells me very little," I say.

"Sorry, I should explain," she says.

"Yes," I reply quickly, trying not to laugh.

With that lovely face she's got she just pouts for a second and gives me that ever so penetrating dead stare of hers.

"Anyways…there's a quest tied to this item, it's active and waiting for you to complete a part of it."

"What do you mean waiting for me?" I question, tilting my head a little.

"When you gave me this key I started looking for what it opened. It so turns out it opens a hidden library in this floor," she says, "And just three days ago the quest tracker updated, it changed. It now says you have to place the key's crest on the switch."

"How do you know there's a duplicate?" Ruri butts in.

"The quest tracker says," she makes a short dramatic pause, "To place the crest of the key on the switch."

"Yeah you already said that," I interrupt.

"One out of two," Argo says with a grin.

I turn to Ruri to see her raise an eyebrow and naturally I just do the same.

"So...someone with another key already set the crest on the switch?" I ask.

"Exactly," Argo exclaims.

"So there's probably a stranger here, then?" Ruri asks.

"I doubt anyone would wait more than a day looking for another key," Argo says.

We manage to make it to the top of a dune and scan around the top. Nothing to be seen anywhere in front of us except for sand. We must be closing in on the edge of the floor.

"There's nothing at all here, just dumb sand," I say and kick the sand at my feet.

"It must be around here though, it's probably covered in sand," Argo huffs, "The manuscript said something about this place being forgotten by time and what not."

After saying that Argo gets on her knees and quite literally starts digging down on the sand. Ruri finds an odd rock and sits on it, letting out a deep sigh of disappointment.

"What were you expecting?" I ask.

"I don't know, some action I guess," she says with a pouty mouth.

She starts swinging her feet and quickly loses balance. Ruri falls backwards unto the sand and a quick puff of it can be seen as she hits the sand itself. I walk over to help her up. I laugh a little in the process. Watching people fall never goes out of style.

"Here, give me your hand pervert," I joke and stretch my arm out.

She reaches out quickly and I take hold of her, as I pull her up I notice some strange markings on the rock. Not really meaning to, I let go off her and start examining the rock closer. The markings are weird, straight lines that make an odd pattern. Then it hits me, this is cobblestone.

"I think I found something," I say.

With my hands I start moving the sand away from the stone. Eventually I start digging on its side till I find something brown colored. I stop and notice I'm practically standing on what I would think to be a door.

"At this angle…?" I mutter to myself.

Argo is already at my side, digging with her hands. Ruri still lies on the on the ground, giving up completely on standing up she swings her feet in the air. I get down again and start digging alongside Argo. Moving the sand away from the brown surface it in fact reveals a door. The door points straight up, looking at the sky, maybe it broke off from its hinges? Surely, this whole structure couldn't have toppled, I reason, although a seed of doubt plants itself in my mind.

It takes a bit of time but soon enough Argo and I manage to rid the door's surface of sand. A shiny golden knob stares at us with a huge keyhole right under it.

I take the key into my hand and stare at it for a few seconds. I breathe in deeply and clench it tight. Argo steps back and puts both of her hands on her hips.

"Daath held unto this for some reason," I say and turn to Argo, "No offense, but I doubt he'd need your help to find where it lead."

"None taken-I guess," she utters with a nod.

"Al…maybe it's just a quest he wanted to complete…" Ruri mumbles, "Try not to look so much into it, ok?"

"Right…" I say and clench the thing tighter in my hand, "Yeah...yeah, you are right."

Argo pats my shoulder. A nice gesture, with nothing but nice thoughts behind it but I just want to shrug it off. A gust of wind surges through, so strong I have to reposition my footing. I bend a knee and place my open palm on the wooden door.

"Well…here goes nothing."

I get my hand closer to the keyhole and the key itself breaks free from my grip and embeds itself on the keyhole.

"What the…"

A flash of light blinds me and I feel myself lose all footing. Am I getting teleported? What the hell is going on? Regaining my vision I see nothing but a faint light in a completely dark area. The light ever so slightly illuminates a small amount of sand below me. This is when I notice I'm falling. Bracing myself I cover my head and slam harshly on the little mount of sand that generated below me. I roll on my side and the dumb key hits me in the face.

"Gah! Seriously?!"

I steady myself with my hands as I get up and the small beam of light fades into nothing. I can't tell if my eyes are closed or open.

"Argo?! Ruri?!"

In the corner of my eyes I can no longer see their health bars. I only see mine, it's like staring at a black screen with my name on the top left corner. I swipe my fingers down and my menu pops up. I can only barely see my hand because of the contrast it makes. I go over to my inventory and take out a small lantern. It begins to shine brightly and it almost immediately makes my vicinity a bit clearer. All I see around me are worn down desks and chairs. Books littered both on top of the tables and on the floor. They are scattered everywhere, some closed, some open, torn out pages here and there. Some of the tables have very old candle sticks on top of them. Holding the lantern with my left hand I bend over and pick up the key that fell not too far from me.

"What the hell is going on?" I mutter to myself.

I walk through the desks and chairs. Cobwebs riddle some and some are toppled on the ground. It looks a little cliché but I'm not here to critique the area's decoration.

"Ruri?! Argo?!" I yell once again.

My voice echoes loudly and then I hear something that makes a horrible goose bump go down my spine.

"Ruri…Argo…" the darkness echoes back, sounding eerily like a groggy version of my own voice.

"What the…fuck," I huff, "Hey! Stop playing around!"

What the hell was that? It barely sounded like someone was mocking me. It was downright creepy.

"Stop….playing….around…" the deformed voice utters.

A loud annoying clicking is heard right afterwards. I hear something that sounds like stepping in viscous goo coming closer. I can hear chairs being toppled and desks being moved around behind me. I turn around and walk in the opposite direction, but it matches me step for step. Thanks to the lantern I can just barely see something in the darkness, approaching me. Whatever it is it doesn't seem to have a consistent silhouette. It looks like a moving blob of something but I can just barely tell it apart from the darkness it shrouds itself in.

"Ruri…Argo…stop playing…around," it says.

The tone itself makes my hair stand on edge. As I walk backwards I trip over a fallen chair and fall on my back. The lantern flies out of my grip and smashes against the ground, leaving me once again in total darkness.

Shit.

I get up on my feet, nearly stumbling back on my back. I can't see anything. I draw my sword and activate a sword skill. My sword shines brightly and it barely illuminates what's around me. I turn around, then side to side, trying to locate this presence but I come up with nothing. I keep stepping back when my left foot hits something mushy.

"What the…"

I'm yanked from my footing and drop my sword in the process. My head slams against the ground as my body is carelessly tossed through the air. I still can't see a thing but the feeling of being thrown around is one you cannot easily confuse. Not knowing what to do I brace myself yet again and feel a weird pain across my stomach as I'm brought to sudden stop. I fall to what I can only assume is the ground and quickly get on my feet. I open my inventory and take out a smaller lantern. I cough loudly and rest my right hand on the illuminated bookshelf next to me. Not too far from me down the narrow walkway surrounded by shelves I see a girl. Her golden eyes shine brightly because of my lantern. She has a lantern herself and her right arm seems to be shaking wildly. On her left hand she brands a spear. I raise my lantern towards her and take a step forwards.

"Hey, you!" I shout.

The girl turns around and starts running away from me. I start running myself trying to keep up as close as I can. I can barely make her out when she turns right at the end of the narrow path. It splits into two, right or left. Either way there's nothing but shelves or books. I go right, meaning to still give her chase. I see nothing but complete darkness beyond what my lantern illuminates.

"What…?"

"Stop playing around!" booms loudly behind me.

To my right on the bookshelf a panel below the shelf slides open. Inside, the girl is kind of cramped up in the tight compartment. She holds the lantern out a little and pulls on my arm.

"He…here!" she yelps.

Reacting quickly I unequip my lantern and get myself inside the small compartment. Pushing her around a little I somehow manage to fit inside with her and she slides the panel close. I'm probably about an inch or so away from her face and my legs have somehow found a way to end up between hers. Her lips tremble a little and her lantern still shines brightly next to my face. That slithering disgusting sound can now be heard just outside our hiding place and panicking a little I turn off her lantern. She starts quivering and breathing rapidly. I hold my hand to her mouth in a really bad attempt to calm her down.

"Shh, come on, it's right outside," I whisper.

She holds her hand to my mouth as well and continues to shake. Muffled I try to say something but she just further pushes her hand against my lips. All that can be heard is our gradually slowing down breathing and the nasty viscous sound just outside the compartment. Slowly I get my hand off of her mouth and press both of my hands behind her head. I try my best to get away from her personal space but still I can feel her breathing on my face. She let's go of my mouth.

"It's dark…" she whimpers.

"I know but keep quiet."

She lights up her lantern again. I can clearly see her face and those shiny golden eyes again. Her hair is auburn with an odd black streak on the left side, it's pretty and reminds me of a girl who lived near me.

"Shut that off," I mutter and try to reach for her arm.

"No...it'll be dark if I do," she whines.

"Who cares, that thing is outside!" I huff.

"It won't notice it!" she says, trying to keep her voice down.

"How do you even know?" I snap back.

"I…I've been here some days alright?" she answers.

"Wait you are…you got the quest tracker to change, didn't you?"

"You have a key?" she asks, her eyebrow rising in the process.

I struggle in the cramped space but manage to dig the key out of my pocket.

"You mean this?"

She simply nods and tries to move a little. Her movement just makes her all that closer to me and I realize that pretty much my all of my body is touching hers except for my hands and face.

"Stop moving please…" I mumble.

"You…you are the one that's all over me…" she complains.

"You were the one that told me to get in here."

She nods again and avoids my eyes, she decides it's better to stare at my chest. Again I do the uncomfortable task to reach into my pocket, this time to get a health potion. I do so managing not to get this tiny place any more cumbersome and uncap the little vial with my teeth.

"It won't work," she mutters.

"What?"

"Your health won't recover," she says.

I drink the potion after discarding her comment as nonsense. My health that stands at ninety percent full doesn't recover at all.

"What the hell?"

"Told you," the girl says while still just staring dead center on my chest.

"What's wrong with this place?" I ask, "I got kicked off my party, I can't heal...lost my fucking sword…"

"This is a dungeon of some sort…" she mumbles, "I can't heal at all or send any messages out."

I drag my menu down and start poking and prodding my messages tab. It seems I cannot send any messages as she says, and I doubt I can receive them either. Argo or Ruri would've already sent me something. Desperate I click and move around my menu when I notice it feels a bit soft and squishy. Focusing a little I realize my menu has been overlaying the poor girl. I'm currently poking her breast, where my friends tab is. She is blushing and her lips are curled in a really funny way.

"Shit…I am sorry," I say and dismiss my menu.

She somewhat weakly slaps my cheek. I say this to humor her but it was more of a light pat on my right cheek.

"I'm really sorry," I huff.

She leans a little to her left and ever so slightly slides the panel open. She peeks out a bit and then closes the panel again.

"Is it safe?" I ask.

"No, it takes a while," she says.

"How much is a while?"

"Uhm…I once had to hide for five hours," she mumbles.

"What? I can't hear you."

"I had to hide for five hours!" she says really quickly and in a high pitched tone.

Damn.

* * *

My leg is starting to cramp up, how the hell is it cramping up anyways? Perhaps I cannot tell reality from SAO anymore. It's happened a few times anyways. My brain has finally been getting adjusted to its new reality…and that sucks. I shift slightly but in the process prod the girl with my knee. I back away quickly and I hit my head on the top of the compartment. Staying still now I just sigh out of annoyance.

"How long has it been?" I ask.

"Like thirty minutes…I think," she responds.

"What? No way," I complain, and then stay silent for a few seconds, "I'm getting out of here."

I manage to slide the panel open, clumsily exiting with little resistance. I crawl a few feet away from the compartment before getting up. The girl's lantern only slightly shines in the area. I extend my hand in front of me and can no longer see it as it's in the darkness. I carefully scan around the lit up area. It's quiet, I can hear myself breathe, but that's about it. The girl stares at me from her little compartment. She isn't moving, just by looking at her you can see that she feels safe there. She has no intention of coming out but still she just stares.

"You are not coming out?" I ask.

She shakes her head. I reach for my sword but as I grasp thin air I remember it is no longer in my sheath.

"God dammit…" I mutter, "We should…uh stick together. Hey, I have an idea! Where's the place where you set your key?"

"I don't wanna go…" she mumbles.

"Don't you want to get out of here?" I ask.

"Well yeah but…it's dangerous, I don't want to die," she answers.

I scratch my head and look around the darkness. Slowly the girl's lantern starts fading, her eyes widen in panic and she gets out of her hiding hole.

"No, no, no, no…." she squeaks and hits her lantern with her free hand.

"Out of oil, huh?" I comment.

She gets closer to me and just as her light fully extinguishes I can feel her gripping tightly at my arm. I laugh for a second until she violently raises my arm and brings it down to open up my menu.

"Hey…"

"Take out your lantern!" she says and moves my finger through my own menu.

"Fine, fine…hang on," I huff and shake her off.

I select my lantern and as soon as it materializes she takes it away from my hand and lights it. She shines it around about and then breathes easy.

"You are afraid of the dark?" I ask ever so tactfully.

"Ye…yes," she admits.

"All the more reason to stick together and get out of here," I say, "I have a lantern and you know where this key goes."

"Fine, but I carry the lantern," she says as she holds it close to her chest.

"Heh, you remind me of someone," I say, "Hey, so what's your name?"

"Tami-uh… Siren!" she yelps.

"Tamisiren?" I ask.

The girl blushes and twiddles her fingers a bit, she looks away and clears her throat.

"No it's just…Siren…" she mutters.

"Haha, wait, were you going to tell me your real name?" I ask.

"No!"

I laugh some more and go through my menu to add her as a friend. The notification pops up in-front of her and she jumps back a little. She stares at the floating box for a few seconds and I see her smile briefly.

"It's been a while since I saw one of these," she says softly. "Nice…uh to meet you, Alshep."

She presses the circle to accept me as a friend and then I send her a party invite.

Hesitating less, she accepts it as well and her health bar appears below mine. I smile as well for a second. I may be lost in the dark but at least now I'll be lost with someone else.

"Let's get going then," I say and start moving, a step later I stop and look at her, "Where to? Haha…"

"You are actually going the right way," she says and a spear materializes in her hand.

Much like a cane she ever so slightly supports herself with it and I follow closely as I equip an axe I had lying around in my inventory. I give it a few short swings and get a feeling on its weight. This will have to do.

"You have a guild," Siren says.

"Huh? Um yeah…" I mumble.

"I just saw your emblem I…I thought I should uh comment on it," she says and coughs to clear her throat awkwardly.

"We are just a bunch of people, who try to help other players," I explain.

"You help players?" she asks.

I follow her closely as she lights the way carefully around the dark library.

"Yeah, we help people level up and complete quests they are having trouble with," I laugh for a second, "We are like an extended tutorial."

"That's a first," she says, "All the other guilds I've heard about are either about clearing parties or red players."

"We are a…unique bunch," I laugh.

We keep walking as our steps echo slightly, we go past a few really torn down bookshelves and Siren stops and presses her back against a shelf. I do so as I well and get close to her. She peeks out of the bookshelf and quickly hides again. Suddenly a viscous sound becomes more apparent and seconds later that groggy, deformed voice comes off again.

"Leave her! Alone…" it grumbles, sounding a bit like Siren in the process.

Siren starts shaking and she slides down to sit on the floor, she covers her face with her hands and starts sobbing softly. I crouch down and put my hand on her shoulder.

"Are you ok?"

She shakes her head and refuses to look at me.

"It heard you say that..." I mutter, "You weren't alone here…"

She looks at me with her teary eyes and quickly wipes her tears away. She stands up and goes back the way we came with the lantern in her hand. I follow her and we go around the back to avoid the area where that thing is.

"How…how did you come in here with someone else?" I ask.

"She was standing over the door when I used the key," she says quickly, "she is dead, killed by that thing. Anything else you want to know?"

I feel like shit, there's never a filter on me when it comes to my dumb curiosity. I keep silent as I follow her. We turn a right at the end of the hallway and start going down a long row of desks and chairs.

"I'm sorry," I mumble.

"It's ok…just nevermind…" she says, "The place is not that far from here."

I raise the key in my hand and look it at closely. I trace my finger over the symbol and then breathe out. I reach for my hip and take hold of my axe.

"We'll kill that thing…whatever it is," I say.

She continues walking but looks over her shoulder. She looks away quickly and her shoulders drop a little.

"I don't think we can kill it…" she says.

"Why not?"

"I mean…just look at my health," she mutter, "I've tried."

She is right, I didn't give it that much importance at first but her health is but a bit past fifty percent.

"Nothing harms it, swords go through it, fire it just shrugs off…" she mumbles.

"We'll find a way…" I mumble.

We arrive to an area with two pedestals, between the pedestals is a gate. Completely made out of metal the thing closes off what I can only assume is another room or area. She walks and stands in the middle, close to the gate. The pedestal on the left has a symbol identical to the one in my key embedded into it, the only difference being that it's golden.

"You just need to put yours there," she says and point to the pedestal on the right.

I walk over to the pedestal she is pointing at and see that it's missing the embedded symbol. I look at my key and see that the whole key doesn't quite fit in the area given to me.

"Break it off," Siren says, "It's what I did."

I grab my key from both ends and bend it until the symbol on top breaks off. I then take the round piece and insert it into the hole. It fits snugly. I loud clank is heard and cranks pops off from the side of both pedestals.

"That was way too loud," she says.

"Grab the one on that end, now!" I yell.

She heeds to my words and within a second both of us are turning the cranks. The slow, loud noise of gears is heard as we desperately make our best effort to turn our cranks.

"The gate is opening!" Siren yells.

It indeed is, the big metal gate slowly rises from the ground as we turn its mechanism. To my right I see that thick curtain of darkness. I keep turning my end but can't take my eyes out of the darkness, and then I see two glowing red dots. Its eyes…it must be its eyes. He finally sees us.

"Stop playing around….I WILL KILL YOU!" it howls, with a combination of both Siren's and my voice.

"Hurry!" I scream.

I take a look at the gate and it's nowhere near half open. I crank the dam thing as fast as I can but ultimately see that two red eyes getting closer. I stop moving the thing and run over to Siren. I grab her arm and pull her with. The gate begins to close rather fast, but I throw Siren and then myself before it the gate manages to completely close. I start laughing out loud in a weird release of stress. The inside of the room is lit up by torches, blue-ish fire burns brightly a top of them. Ominous as all hell but at least it's lit up. I get up and help Siren on her feet. A small corridor spans in front of us, at the end of a pedestal and a long chest next to in on the floor.

"I don't like this…" she says.

"We could go outside if you want," I joke.

She stares at me with a withdrawn expression.

"Bad joke…" I mumble and walk onwards.

Siren follows me and I crouch to open the large container. I flip the latch up and place my hands on both sides of the chest.

"What if it's a trap?" she asks.

"Then we die," I answer.

"You aren't very funny."

"I think I am," I reply.

I lift the top open and take a peek inside. A sword, still in its sheathe. A bit long for my taste but just the right width, reminds me of a broad sword but yet it manages to look quite compact when compared to one. A simple cross guard but decently decorated with a sapphire on the bottom of the pummel. I pick it up and just now I notice how quiet it is inside of here, I can hear the torches burn and Siren breathing next to me. I slide my hand over the sheathe. It's oddly futuristic, a hexagonal pattern envelops the sheathe, and you can feel the pattern as it's embossed on the sheathe. I pull on the handle a little and I hear as the blade slowly slides out of its sheathe.

"Wow, you are really into that," Siren comments.

"Thanks for ruining the moment," I say with a chuckle, "Mind if I keep this?"

"Go ahead, I just want to get out of here."

I equip the sword and examine it quickly. The sword is named Despot's Downfall, it's way above in stats compared to my last sword, and my last sword was eight times upgraded. Giddy I keep analyzing the sword when a small notification in my skill tabs pops up. I press the tab and a notification appears.

**-Unique Skill Acquired-**

**-Downfall-**

I smile widely and press the skill for more information.

**-Passive: 3% chance a hit neglects target's armor-**

**-Active: Upon contact, strike will break target's armor. Cooldown 2 hours-**

"Hey…I think this is important," Siren says.

I stand up and see that she is holding a piece of paper. I get close and start reading it. It looks like some kind of silly enchantment. The words make little sense and it sounds dumb.

"So darkness leave this plain and let the knight pass on…" I read from the last line of it, "Well mark whoever wrote this as down with the word play."

"What if we're going to need this?" Siren asks with a shrug.

I open my menu and look at the current quest objective.

-Vanquish the Knight-

"Well I guess we have to…" I say reluctantly, "How the hell is that thing even a knight?"

"So do I recite this or something?" Siren asks.

I shrug my shoulders and walk down the oddly lit hallway, the big metal gate stands in my way again. But this time there's a lever on the right wall close to it. I place my hand on the lever and look back, Siren nervously grips the piece of paper in her hands. I nod at her and she shakes her head. Still with the need to move forward I pull on the lever and slowly the gate begins to rise on its own. The thing takes it sweet time on completely opening but once It does we find ourselves in front of that consuming darkness again.

"Darkness leave this plane, let the light shine through…" Siren mumbles.

For a second a set of troches near the pedestals light themselves with fire. Both Siren and I stand back, being a bit on edge by the whole situation.

"Di…did I do that?" she asks.

"Try it again, a bit louder," I say.

"Darkness leave tis plane, let the light shine through…" Siren utters.

"Louder!" I huff as the torches start lighting themselves again.

"Le-let the light come forth and vanish the darkness on us!" Siren yells nervously.

Right away our vicinity almost immediately becomes brighter. Torches on the wall and candles on the tables light up, finally revealing the worn out library we've been stumbling through.

"Keep going," I say.

"For this plain is far too innocent, for it to be shrouded in darkness would cause no gain," Siren recites, "We chant of the knight who vanquished the dark, the one who in exchange gave his life."

From the shrinking darkness I see the red eyes again, the thing lets out an unholy howl and the red dots quickly start cutting the distance towards us. I take out my new sword and with my free hand shield Siren.

"Come on, hurry," I say.

Her eyes dart around the page as she nervously struggles to pick up where she left off.

"The one who perished on the eternal night, the one who saved the land around," she says, "We chant of him so we remember, we chant so he remembers."

Finally coming out of the darkness I see a shiny helmet, behind it those fiendish eyes. A blob of dark matter and pieces of metal incrusted on it makes an outlandish path to us. Tumbling and pushing whatever is around as it tries to get closer.

"So we chant for that he might be granted rest!" Siren yells, "So darkness leave this plain and let the knight pass on!"

The thing stops just a few feet away from me and just stares right at me with those unblinking red eyes. The dark matter retracts slowly letting an armor go back to its original form. A steel armor, covered from head to toe. The knight still breathes inside, he does so heavily and sounding tired. He takes a few steps towards me and with those ominous eyes he cries.

"Was…he haunted…or something?" Siren asks.

"Stop playing around…kid, release me…please end this…" It mumbles.

I take a step back and activate my new skill. My sword is enveloped by an odd black shine as I do. I swing at the knight who was forgotten by time. My blade slashes cleanly through his armor and he falls to its knees before disappearing.

"Poor man…" Siren says.

"I guess…NPC or not…he was trapped here, every bit as much as we were," I mutter.

A result screen appears before me and Siren. We receive a ton of XP and Col, thankfully. I just manage to turn my body slightly when I'm enveloped in light. I fall a few feet to unstable sand and manage to fall on my face. I try to stand up only to be slammed against the sand again.

"Oh god…sorry, sorry, sorry," Siren squeaks and gets off of me.

"It's ok…"

"But…like you have to admit, you deserve worse…" she says.

"Huh, what for?" I ask.

"Touching me and stuff when we were cramped in there…" she mumbles.

"Haha, you did what?"

I turn around and see Ruri sliding down the small dune along with Argo. Oh boy…great. As soon as she reaches me she jumps into my arms and gets her mug as close to mine as she can.

"You get dirty when you got no one watching over you, huh?" she teases.

I drop her into the sand and start walking in a random direction.

"Did you find something down there?" Argo asks.

I pat my new sword on its sheathe and keep walking.

"Hey, at least tell us what happened," Argo begs.

"Yeah, I wanna know of the touching in the cramped place!" Ruri screams.

"Who is she?" Argo asks.

"I'm Siren," she quickly answers.

"Where did Al touch you?" Ruri asks.

As I get away I try my best to block out their chatter as they seem to be tagging along not far behind me. I better get to the house first before Ruri starts running her mouth. I look back and see Siren with a smile as she talks to Argo and Ruri. She didn't really smile down there. I smile as well and keep my steady pace in the damned sand. I cover my eyes from the sun and chuckle to myself.

"You'll have to tell me all about it when we go back to the house," Ruri insists.

Sand, heat…and all things neat.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thanks again to the wonderful mangachiaki for beta-reading this chapter!

So once again I sort of wanted to try something new with this chapter that I'm not quite sure I executed properly. Did you get a creepy or scary vibe from this chapter? If so then I accomplished my goal, so YAY! This was very fun to write mainly cause describing creepy stuff is hard...and even so I don't even know if I did so correctly. Anyways! Meet Siren! She is a character submitted to my story by the one and only **BeastZoroark145**! I hope I did justice to the details he give me about her, I guess we'll see if he leaves a review about it. We'll see more of her in the future definitely. Haha I now come to realize I might've scared a few people with the title of this chapter, but it's me merely being cheesy about my story haha! MOVING ON!

Super glad to see that the new couple is widely accepted between you few that leave reviews! I was actually somewhat scared that no one would like the pairing. But that turned out well, besides Ruri seems to be enjoyed by most of you and that is also good. She is one of my favorites to be honest, I really do enjoy writing her quirks and completely inappropriate comments. BUT ARE YOU READY FOR ANOTHER CHAPTER FROM HER POINT OF VIEW? I HOPE YOU ARE CAUSE COMING UP NEXT WEEK WE HAVE RURI-MANIA! (I'm funny right?...right!?)

As always, if you like what you read, just want to comment anything on my story, ask a question, etc! Please leave a review and I'll be sure to address it on an AN or PM as I see appropriate.

Thank you for reading! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Min-Maxing"


	39. Chapter 39 - Min-Maxing

**Chapter 39.- Min-Maxing**

**October/3rd/2023**

**Forty Eighth Floor of Aincrad – Lindarth Outskirts**

**Ruri**

Round and round goes this waterwheel. Slowly the river next to the house courses and makes the giant wooden wheel spin. I rest my head on the bridge's barrier and press my cheek against the slightly cold stone. The slight trickling sound of water is soothing, even more so when complemented by that slight creaking of the wheel. I push myself off the barrier and look around. I breathe out through my nose as a nice draft of hit my body. I chuckle slightly and start walking down the road. Let's get started.

A light jog which easily enough I turn into a full sprint. Now let's finish leveling up that jumping trait. I bend my knees just slightly as I run and launch myself off the ground. I land on top of one of the medieval looking house and just barely adjust my footing as I fall on the fluffy hay that covers the roof. Seconds after landing I jump again and land on another nearby waterwheel, this one turns much slower and I start skipping along over it as it turns. It's like a fun game of trying not to fall in the space in between the paddles. While skipping along I bring down my menu and go into the player tab. It shows the gear I'm currently using, my skills and current boons. A little more clicking around and I find myself in my trait list. Lock picking is almost completed, it stands at nine hundred and ninety but jumping is a bit far behind, standing at eight hundred and five. Still has a bit to go but I really want to focus on it today. I get distracted and on the last little jump I make and slip in between one of the spaces. My leg slips right in and I find myself stuck as the damn wheel keeps turning. I try to yank my leg out but it only feels like it's getting harder to pull out. I grab he the edges of the wheel and look back at the water. My body is now parallel to the river and I feel weird as my body just keeps angling itself towards the water. I give up on trying to free my leg and just hold my breath as the wheel takes me underwater. Looking around I see some colorful fishes zooming about with the slow current. It takes almost thirty second for the wheel to finally take me out of the water and I gasp for air once I'm out.

"What are you doing in my water wheel?"

I lift my head and see a tall, short haired woman peeking out from one of the windows on the house. She sports this absurdly fluffy-looking white fur coat, something quite odd to be wearing with this heat if you ask me. This woman stands out and is quite pretty but I quickly lose sight of her as the wheel keeps spinning with me stuck on it. I try my best to free my leg again but soon enough I find myself underwater, again. As soon as my head surfaces I start kicking one of the paddles my leg is stuck in between with my other leg.

"Hey, don't you dare break that!" The woman yells from her window.

"Then help me!" I whine and stop struggling as the wheel once again takes me out of her view.

I'm about to go underwater yet again when the wheel stops. I feel part of my back touching the water but at least it's not all of my body. I relax my body and float on my back, the sun touches my face and it feels nice and warm. A great contrast to the cold water running through my back. I close my eyes and lose myself in the feeling.

"So, are you going to get off my waterwheel?"

I open my eyes and see the woman towering over me, she covers the gentle sunlight touching my skin and I can't help but to smile in a short moment of awkwardness. I'm so close to the little bit of land she is standing on. It's close to the river and she could just easily help me out of this thing.

"You see, I can't get off myself," I chuckle, "Well I can but that is not the issue here, if you know what I mean."

"Great, not only do you dress like a commoner but you also talk like one," she huffs.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

She sighs and crouches.

"Here, take my hand," she says.

I take hold of her tiny wrist with both of my hands and start pulling myself once I feel her pull on me as well. After a few strong tugs she manages to free me from her demonic wheel. The rest of my body goes underwater and I keep myself afloat by grabbing unto the grass where this woman stands.

"Now, please, let me get back to work," she says.

"Hey," I say trying to get her attention, "Thank you."

She only turns slightly to take one last look at me and then walks away.

"Don't mention it."

"Meh meh don't meh-ntion it," I say in a mocking tone to myself.

I pull myself out of the water and walk around the house to its door. A little sign hangs from the side. It simply reads "Ashley's". I set my left hand on my hip and take a good long look at the façade. Comparing it to other houses, this one is particularly fancy. The windows are some nice looking blown glass, seeing through them you can see a lot of mannequins. Some wearing dresses, other just shirts and pants, all of them different and very colorful. The door to the place is a very outstanding tone of brown, on top of that it has golden fittings. Even the knob on the door is shiny as hell.

I look down at my clothes and see they are still completely drenched with water. I pull on my shorts and then on the black shirt that is tightly secured by the leather armor over it. Opening my inventory I see I have no other clothes to wear. And from simple deduction I reach the conclusion that this place in front of me is a clothing store. I shrug slightly and decide to walk over to the door. I turn the knob and the door easily swings open. When the door is past halfway open a small bell chimes, I can't help but to look up at the tiny bell placed on the inside wall above the door. Very gimmicky. The inside feels cozy, I feel like I'm close to a fire place but there's really none nearby. I can now get a better look at some of the clothes, it's all very fashionable for my taste but they look great on the stands and mannequins.

"Hello, welcome to Ashley's ah…it's you," the woman with the fluffy coat says.

"You are horrible to your patron," I reply.

"I have no care for you girl, besides you can't afford anything I have to offer," she says smugly, "Are you…? Why are you all wet and dripping on my floor?"

"Well you see, I don't exactly find you that attractive," I joke, "Are you kidding me right now? You pulled me out of your damn water wheel like less than a minute ago."

"Is that an excuse for you to make a mess out of my floor?" the woman miffs.

She goes behind the small counter she has set up and quickly emerges with a mop and something else on her other hand. She approaches me quickly with this strong air to her. She pushes me back and places a folded white dress on my hands, she then turns to the side quickly and from one of her counters grabs a pair of white kitten heels.

"What?" I blurt out, feeling very confused.

"Put those on, while I know you can't afford anything on my store, I won't let you roam around it drenched in dirty water."

I look at my hands that hold the dress and heels and tilt my head. I put them in my inventory and then equip them. My body shines brightly for a few seconds and once the light disappears I look down at my current clothes.

"A sundress?" I ask.

Feeling just a tad bit awkward in heels I look over my back and lift my right foot to look at them. The knee-length dress flows nicely down my figure. Admittedly I don't have a huge rack but it seems to fit me just right at the chest. It's not tight but it also by no means feels loose. Getting lost in how these clothes fit I fail to notice the woman standing a few feet away from me. She holds her right hand to her chin and stares at me thoroughly.

"You might be of interest to me," she mutters.

"Woah, hold your horses, I'm taken. What do you even mean by that?" I ask.

"You are just so plain, you might just be perfect," she says with a smile.

"Uh…thank you?"

She gets closer and a pin cushion materializes on her wrist. She takes off that bulky coat and elegantly places it over one of the mannequins close to me. She places her right hand on my shoulder and starts making some adjustments to the dress. She does the same to the other shoulder and then places herself in-front of me.

"So what are you doing, exactly?" I question, "I'm all for free clothes but I'm quite weirded out."

"It's not gonna be free, I'm just going to fit this to you, and you alone, you should feel special."

Woah, girl, get off of that high horse. I stand in front of her awkwardly as she continues to put pin after pin on the dress. She gets on her knees and proceeds to do the same to the skirt and ends of the dress. She takes the frills of the dress and pulls them a little to make some adjustments and I feel a nice breeze in-between my legs. She stops her work and slowly turns her head to me.

"Why are you not wearing underwear?" she asks.

"You know, I could answer that," I huff, "but I'm not going to."

"You are strange girl," she mutters as she finishes fixing the dress.

"Damn, people do tend to say that…" I mumble.

She stands up and goes behind her counter again. She looks giddy, I would dare say excited but I can't quite get a read on this fashionista. She comes back with more clothes, this particular set being a mess of pouches and leather straps. She extends it to me and I awkwardly receive it as I feel the pins poking some parts of my body.

"Try these on please," she orders.

I store the clothes in my inventory and try looking for them in my tab.

"So why are you doing this?"

"I'm sure to your inexperienced eye I might not look like much, but I'm a quite capable and famous tailor," she explains, "I have a reputation I have to uphold."

"Right right..." I mumble, "What does that even mean?"

She sighs and strikes a pose, her left hand on her hip and her right resting just over her face. Oh boy, here we go.

"As you can see, hopefully," she sighs, "I sell clothing and accessories, but, I only personally tailor individuals that interest me."

"Wow I feel super special," I mutter under my breath.

"What?"

"I can't wait to try these on hahaha," I correct myself.

I equip the new clothes and see the sundress be replaced with a pair of rather short shorts that make a tight fit and an also slightly tight, plain black top that cuts off at my shoulders and a little over my belly button. Two pouches rest on each side of my hips, they feel baggy but also comfy and very practical. On my right leg on my thigh straps for throwing knifes are strapped tightly. The kitten heels are now replaced by a pair of black boots, plain black boots. Over my hands I now sport fingerless gloves that go up a little past my elbow, they look neat but they are also just black.

"Who would've guessed?" I huff, "You also do perverted clothing. Also isn't this a little too plain for your…flamboyant taste?"

"Shut your mouth, this is merely part of my most exquisite set of armored clothes."

"Armored clothes?" I ponder.

"Clothes with armor qualities and boosts," she says proudly.

"So, armor?"

"No it's different," she says.

"Doesn't really sound like it," I poke.

"Your nonsense aside," she says, sounding irritated, "I'm willing to complete this set for you, but I need your help."

"Ok, this is going kind of fast. A few minutes ago you wouldn't have cared if I drowned and now you need my help?"

"I'm telling you this is a chance of a lifetime for you," she insists, "What you got to lose? You'll get gorgeous clothes and armor."

"So now they are separate things?"

"Ahh you scoundrel!" she hisses.

"Alright alright, I'll help you," I say, sticking my tongue out.

She claps her hands together and smiles very brightly at me. Talk about a mood swing.

"Now, if only you had a high enough lockpicking level I could get the other material I need to fix you something nice," she says.

That's absurdly convenient.

"How high you are looking for on that skill?"

"Seven hundred, maybe higher," she says with an almost dismissive tone.

"So what do you need exactly?" I ask with a wide grin.

* * *

Feeling a bit chilly I rub my own shoulders as I stand next to Ahsley. We go over a really small hill that gives us a really imposing look of a small keep. The thing is a bit run down but with just a quick look you can see it's heavily protected.

"Orcs…" I mumble.

"Or you know something that looks like orc, I'm sure of what they are called," Ashley says.

"So, orcs?" I tease, "Like for real, they are called orcs."

"Do you have like any friends at all?" she asks.

"You would be surprised."

"Either way what I need is inside there," she says. "I would go in myself, but I don't have the required skill to retrieve the items I'm looking for."

"Which are?" I ask raising an eyebrow.

"An unusual warg pelt and a cold steel ingot," she explains, "Both of these items should be in a particularly secured chest."

I can't shake the feeling that this particular treasure hunt isn't safe. Orcs are easy to dispatch. They are slow and pretty dumb, but like anything that is slow and dumb they find strength in numbers. From this little hill alone I can see eight of them so I don't have the best feeling about this. I open up my inventory and sort it by consumable items. I have a few health vials and a couple of stronger health potions. Twelve throwing knives and five picks. I made sure of giving proper maintenance to my daggers so they seem to be doing quite alright.

"I can give you a few items and draughts, I know it's not the safest of tasks," Ashley admits.

You don't say.

"I won't say no to that," I huff.

She gives me twenty lock picks, two attack boosting draughts and two bombs. Confused I hold the bomb, its round like a ball and it has a huge fuse. The fuse itself is super stiff. It reminds of those exaggerated cartoon bombs just smaller.

"How do even light this thing?"

"Just strike the fuse against any surface," she says, "That should make it catch fire."

"Alright then, I think I'm set," I nod confidently.

"I'll wait for you around here, try not to die," she says.

"I'll try!" I say raising my hand as make my way to the keep.

Now how to go about this? There's probably a secret entrance or two outside this ill maintained structure. Then again I've never been one to be discreet. The question boils down to how many green dudes I want to kill. I think it's as good time as any to try that new weapon and its set of skills. Changing weapons quickly, the sheathe of my weapon changes to my back. I reach behind my head and grab the small custom made hilt. Unsheathing the blade sounds nice. I bring it in front of me and trace my fingers over its curvy blade. Lisbeth knows how to make pretty steel. A short Kalis with an ivory hilt it's a beautiful combination of a black steel blade and white ivory at the hilt. I sheathe it again and open my skill tab in my menu.

"Reaper's Touch…" I mumble, "Deals five times more damage to unsuspecting enemies." I read.

Stealth isn't always viable but if I manage to get the jump on one of these guys it shouldn't take long to kill him. I haven't used this type of weapon much so I only have four skills for it. The basic slash attack is there, but that's it it's just basic. Another skill is a simple counter attack that requires me to parry before activating. The last skill is quite unusual and I'm eager to try since it's exclusive to this type of weapon. Death Lock is a skill that deals a guaranteed critical hit, but it requires an enemy to be oblivious to your presence and for your blade to make contact with the enemy's weak spot. For orcs this is the head. To make it better Death Lock stacks with Reaper's Touch so if done properly I could be killing these guys with just one hit. I'm on approach to the keep's gate but stop myself. Let's try to be stealthy this time. Keeping my distance from the keep I start going around it looking for another entrance. Thank god orcs are short sighted, I can see them clearly at their posts along the keep's wall but they don't seem to even notice me. Literally on the opposite side of the gate there is a hole on the wall, big enough for me to slip in. Actually this is big enough for three Owls to slip in.

"These orcs are going to need to fire their security detail," I joke to myself.

The best audience for any kind of bad jokes is obviously yourself. I walk over at a brisk pace, no orcs guard this side of the keep, something really dumb if you ask me. I clamber over a few rocks and pull myself on the hole's edge.

"Then again.." I mumble, "this could be some sort of…"

I jump inside the keep and find myself in one of the room's inside, the orc's sleeping quarters to be precise. Filled with snoring orcs all of them in stupidly large bunk beds. I take one step back to press my back against the wall and look up to see the hole in the wall is now far from my reach.

"Trap…"

Seven. Seven of these sleeping snots. I breathe in deeply and press my hands on the wall behind my back. Gotta be careful now. I gently push myself off the wall and start tiptoeing my way to the room's door. It amazes me how their own snoring doesn't wake them up. Going just barely close to one of the bunks the snoring is almost deafening on my ear. I guess it doesn't help to have high straining. I make a little jump over an orc sleeping on the ground and make it to the door. I put my hand on the knob and slowly turn it. Once the door unlocks I hear a very peculiar sound. A somewhat loud snap and then what I can perfectly place as rope running through a pulley. I open the door quickly and grab a piece of rope as it zips upwards. Relaxing a little I trace the rope to a pulley on the ceiling, it holds a ceramic base on the other end. Just inches from the ground I slowly let the base lower into the floor. I sigh deeply and hold my right hand to my stomach.

"Oh man that was close," I mutter as I slam shut the door behind me.

I slam my palm against my forehead as I can hear the snoring inside the room stop. I dig into my left pouch and take out a bomb. I strike the fuse against the wall next to the door and successfully light the fuse. I open the door quickly and throw the bomb inside. I close the door by pulling it and take out my short blade from my back. The blade whirs in my hand and the bomb inside goes boom. I run towards the door and with my body to bash it in. A cloud of black smoke fills the room but not enough to interfere with my sight. I count four orcs and roll behind one that is covering his eyes. I jump a bit and stab my blade through its neck. I quickly retrieve it and prepare the slash skill, with a quick swipe to the right I kill the first one and jump back as the smoke dissipates completely from the room. The remaining fiends growl at me and at the same time charge at me. I run towards them and slide on the ground between them. I turn my body around as I slide and get back on my feet quickly. The sword shines brightly again and I slash attack the three orcs. They merely flinch and one turns around swinging its bastard sword. I swing at his blade and manage to overpower his swing. The sword whirs and lights up again and I counterattack effectively. I get too giddy and for a second forget about the other two, but I'm quickly reminded as one of the others hits me in the stomach with a club. I cough loudly as I step back and get my guard up.

"You guys play rough, huh?"

"Raaaahhh!" they yell in unison.

"Raaahhhhh!" I bellow back.

They stare at me, the big dummies probably didn't expect anything like that from me. Reaching the pouch on my thigh I take out three knives and throw them at the orcs. Two are coated with paralyzer and the other with poison. The two with paralyzer hit the ones with the higher health. The poison coated one hits the weaker one right in the stomach. With the two others being unable to move I jump at the poisoned orc and drive my blade through its chest. I barely manage to topple it over and sit on its fat stomach. I pull the kalis and then drive it through the head. It stops struggling and in the blink of an eye disappears.

"Right, only two to g-"

I'm interrupted by a swift swing of a club to the face. The impact makes me stumble back and I trip over the uneven floor of the room. I raise my hand up to my cheek and rub it gently.

"That was rude," I complain.

The orc with the club swings at me again but I drag myself back a little and open my legs. The club barely misses me and smashes the ground between my legs. I roll on my back and gracefully I somehow manage to roll completely back up on my feet. I step forwards and over the club and slash at the orcs neck. I touch down right in-front of his other friend and duck as he swings his hammer over me. I slice his belly and jump just to jump right back and stab his chest. I turn in my head and see the club heading my way again. I drop to the ground and the orc hits his friend right in the chest over my sword. The orc disappears and my blade drops to the ground.

"Thanks big guy," I huff and roll to grab my blade again, "Man just wearing clothes makes you move better."

I stop talking to myself and parry a few blows from the orc. Finally once again overpower his swing and counter attack with the sword skill. I turn around as I swing my blade and manage to cleanly cut the orc's head off. I take a step back and sheathe the kalis at my back. I dust off my hands and then press both of them on my hips as I puff my chest out proudly.

"Oh yeah, I'm good," I say.

I head out of the room as I drink a healing potion my health didn't go past half a bar but it definitely got close. I throw the vial away and peek into the corridor just outside the room. It's clear but I should tread carefully, don't want to run into any more traps. There's a lovely stench on the corridor, the worse kind. It's humid and super stinky. A little bell sounds off near my ear and I notice I have a message. I open my menu and quickly switch over to my messages.

-From: Ashley  
-To: Ruri  
-Subject: Getaway  
-Message: I very much doubt you'll be able to completely weave un-averted through that small fortress. So I've secured two horses to make our escape. I will be waiting on the hill where I left you. Please, try to be careful.

How thoughtful. I'm about to close my menu when I notice I have another unread message.

-From: Kayla  
-To: Ruri  
-Subject: About yesterday…  
-Message: Hey…I don't know where you ran off to, and you didn't tell me anything. I'm sorry about getting mad yesterday…please just come back soon, ok?

I press the reply command and stare at the floating keyboard for a few seconds before closing my menu completely. It wasn't even my fault, not completely anyways…

"Meh…I'll deal with things when I get back," I say to myself.

In the corridor I reach two doors. I open the one on the left and see that it leads up through some really dark stairs. The one on the left leads down, most likely to the inner courtyard and thus the exit. I take the right door and little by little make my way up the stairs to a set of double doors.

"Now this is where I would hide all my rare pelts and ingots," I joke to myself and crouch to take a look at the keyhole.

I take a lock pick out of my pouch and get to work. I close my eyes and try to concentrate con the clicks of the lock. The door doesn't even come close to the hardest thing I've picked so far and I manage to open it in under a minute.

"Easy peasy," I huff and turn the knob.

The door silently swings open and I find myself in a rather big room. A huge bed is all the way in the back of the room, on top of it another orc. This one is easily twice as big as the ones I encountered downstairs. Probably a leader or something, could also be a sub-boss. Judging by how hard he is snoring he definitely sounds like an imposing figure. Taking a second to look around the room I notice a very discrete big as hell golden chest.

"Gee I wonder where the items might be…" I mumble.

Leaving the door open I make my way to the chest and take out another lock pick. I take a good long look at the lock and trace my fingers over the keyhole. This shouldn't be that hard. I start picking the lock and the first thing I notice is how rigid the thing is, seconds later I break my first lock pick. With the hook I dig out the bit that broke and take another pick out of my pouch. This time instead of trying the lock right away I examine it. I probe all the way to the back and feel the different locks as I trace the pick over them. Once again I start working my magic and not even three tugs later my pick breaks again.

"Damn…" I huff silently as I dig out the broken pieces.

I sit down in front of the chest and then slowly lie down on my back. I breathe in and out loudly and stare at the ceiling. There's a hole on it and I can see some clouds and just a little past them the next floor above. I sit up quickly and look around the room again.

"Well, so much for lockpicking...maybe there's a key…"

I stand up and go to one of the drawers nearby. I open them and as quietly as I can rummage through all the garbage inside. Random pieces of meat, herbs and even what the game has categorized as a human skull. You know, the standard affair of what you can find in an orc's drawer. I close the drawers I opened and lean a little on the furniture. Barely glancing over to the orc I see a quick gold shimmer on the thing's neck. I raise an eyebrow and get closer to the massive guy. A golden key dangles from his neck. I make a rather unimpressed expression to myself. I don't know whether to think if it's just too damn convenient or lazy quest design. I take out a throwing knife from my pouch and lift the key slowly. With a quick pull I cut the thread holding the key to the orc's neck. As soon as I do so, it opens it eyes. I push the knife through its chest and run to the chest. Thankfully the knife should be coated with paralyzer. The key turns smoothly inside the lock and I lift the cover open. I grab the pelt and ingots inside and put them in my inventory. I stand up quickly and I turn around just in time to forcefully be lifted off the ground by my neck. I clutch at the orc's massive hand as it easily lifts me, choking me slowly. So much for the knife being coated. Coughing and gagging I reach for my back to unsheathe my blade but the orc easily flicks it away from my hand. Growling at me he slams me against the wall, his grip just seems to get tighter as I struggle.

"Gotta give….it to you…" I struggle, "Not being me dinner before this…you sure took a leap."

I feel like I'm fading but in a last struggle I reach for the last bomb in my pouch. I strike the fuse against the wall and hold the thing close to my face. The orc's eyes widen and I just smile as I manage to throw the thing at him. I close my eyes and feel the thing go off not too far from my face. The grip around my throat is released and I fall to the ground. My health is now below fifty percent and I slowly crawl my way into the general direction that I assume to door is. Along the way I stumble on my sword and quickly sheathe it to keep advancing. Not really weighing on the distance and still blinded by smoke I make it to the stairs but misplace my hands and fall down the lovely stretch of pointy steps. Still on the ground I grunt and take out a potion. I drink it quickly and start coughing a bit as some of it goes down the wrong pipe. Loud booming steps start coming down the stairs and I make my way to the sleeping quarters. I open the door and make my way in, I trip over something and fall on my face.

"God damn it…" I whine and open my eyes.

Already standing around me are five orcs. They must've respawned.

"Aw…no fair…"

I roll to the side just in time to avoid being savagely beaten and stand up sluggishly. I go for the door again and into the corridor. I start running to the other set of stairs and see the bigger orc running right at me. I speed up the pace and slide down under it to make it to the other stairs opposite to the ones of its room. Watching my step this time I quickly go down and push the door at the end of the stairs with my body. I make it to a small walled courtyard. I count up to thirteen orcs when I realize I might've not thought this through at all. Immediately they all drop what they are doing and stand up in arms. I draw my weapon and sigh deeply.

"This is not going to end up well," I say.

I ready my slash skill and run towards the center of the fray. Dodging multiple clubs in the progress I manage to reach the center unscathed. About four orcs approach me at once and I turn on my heels as I slash them in a circular motion. They merely stagger back just a bit and soon enough I find myself surrounded by big, green, angry things. Anxiously I point my blade in multiple directions within a short span of time but the orcs seem to not be so eager to attack. Idly they just stand away from me, they grunt and growl at me for some reason.

"What are you guys waiting for?" I ask.

The floor beneath my feet shakes just slightly, shaking harder and harder as something approaches. Over the multitude of orc a particularly large one rises from the direction I came from. The leader, the one I just stole a pelt and ingots from.

"Oh," I utter, "Come on…I'm sure we can work things ou-"

I find myself clutching at my neck yet again. This time the big guy wastes no time and throws my ahead of him. I crash against something but quickly go through it. I fall face first into the ground and get up to see that the massive thing literally threw me through the door of the keep. I ruffle my own hair and crouch as I finally regain my stance. Through the rather sizable hole I made on the gate I can see a small battalion of orcs and their leader running toward me. I turn around and like a mad woman run towards the hill where Ashley dropped me off. I start making my way up and see Ashely peek from the other side. She walks up herself and beckons me with a smile.

"Run!" I yell.

"What?"

"Run, you fool!"

I see her expression change quickly, she probably finally saw the mad mob behind me. I finally make it over the hill and see Ashley as she speeds off on a horse. Another horse is standing there just a few feet away from me. I jump and land right on the saddle. I grunt and grab the reins.

"Go!" I yell and kick the horse's sides.

The thing starts walking very slowly. I can clearly make out the battle cries and grunts of the orcs behind me. I frantically kick its sides and tug the reins in desperation.

"Move dammit!" I grunt, "Please!"

The horse goes from walking to a brisk trot to full out galloping in just a few seconds. Not being ready for this I clutch at the animal's neck and hug it tightly.

"Really?!" I complain, "The magic word is please?!"

Immediately it the horse neighs proudly as if answering my question. I pout and for dear life keep hugging its neck until it decide to easy up the pace. Surprisingly enough it pulls up to Ashley's horse and I just slowly tilt my body to the right until I fall off the demonic animal. Lying on the ground I breathe in deeply and stretch.

"I got the things," I grunt.

"Splendid, now I know a blacksmith that can help us with these ingots," she explains, "So we should get back to my shop."

"Awesome…" I mumble, making sure I sound as unexcited as possible.

"Also…I would get up on my feet," Ashley says, "Even if this is a game, these horses do tend to take a-"

"Aw shit!" I yell.

* * *

"She shouldn't take long now," Ashley mumbles as she thoroughly examines the warg pelt.

"So who is this blacksmith?" I ask, "I know a really cute one. Oh and I guess she is good at being a blacksmith too."

"My my, what a compliment," a familiar voice says behind me.

A pair of hands wrap around my waist and I pulled back to be hugged from behind. Turning my head a little I notice a head of pink hair and laugh.

"This has got to be a weird coincidence," I say.

She let's go off me and gets right next to me just to pull me close to her again. Her hand now on my shoulder she strongly holds me in place.

"What are you saying? Of course everyone knows I'm the best blacksmith around," Lisbeth huffs, "The weird thing is seeing you here with Ashley."

"You know her?" Ashley asks.

"Yes," we answer together.

"Oh boy…" Ashley grumbles, "I guess I shouldn't be surprised."

"Hey!" Lisbeth says, "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nevermind," Ashley replies.

"I'll let your disrespect slide just this once," Lisbeth says, "How did you two even meet anyways?"

"It's a long story, dear," Ashley says and goes behind the counter.

"Yeah, it's a long story," I say and laugh briefly, and then I'm reminded of yesterday, "Hey wait no!"

I push Lisbeth off of me.

"You don't get to be touchy feely with me!" I complain.

"Huh? Why?"

"You got me in trouble with Kayla!" I fume.

She starts laughing and holds her stomach as she leans over one of the glass cases displaying jewelry.

"Seriously? She got mad over that?" she asks.

"My room is not particularly the best place to get funny and randomly start groping me!" I huff.

"Aw come on but it's funny," she says, "Besides I do it all the time with Asuna too."

"Asu-who?"

"I do par take in the inappropriate touching of woman but you don't do it in front of my girlfriend," I rant.

"Oh my god, you two are calling each other that now?" Lisbeth asks, sounding excited.

"No!" I yell, "Maybe! Shut up, ok?!" I say and turn myself away to not look at her anymore.

She laughs soundly and pats my back as she walks past me. Ashley places both the pelt and ingots on top of her counter and rests her elbow over the wooden counter.

"So what am I good for?" Lisbeth asks as she gets closer to the counter.

"I need you to make some metal plating that I can fit to those clothes," Ashely explains and points at me.

I walk over and slightly spread my legs and arms apart to show what I'm wearing. Lisbeth takes a good long look at me and then turns hear head to the ingots.

"I see…I see," she mumbles, "Do you still have that forge on the back?"

"Of course, be my guest," Ashley says and pushes the ingots towards Lisbeth.

"This shouldn't take long," Lisbeth says and goes to the back of the shop.

A bell chimes softly and I turn around to see Kayla entering the shop. Curiously she peeks her head in and once she sees me she smiles brightly and comes in.

"Hey…" I mutter.

"I…uh…I got rather worried," she says, "I used the guild tracker to find you, I hope that's ok."

"Yeah yeah…I'm glad you are here," I say with a smile.

She smiles again and Ashley goes to the back as well, probably from the sheer awkwardness of the situation. Kayla gets close to me and hugs me tightly. A bit surprised I don't hug her back right away but seconds later I embrace her as well. She stops hugging me and softly pecks my lips with hers for a short second.

"I'm sorry about yesterday," she says, "I know it was mostly Lisbeth's fault."

"Yeah…" I answer back slowly.

Still hugging Kayla I turn my head slightly to see if whether Lisbeth plans to make another surprise appearance or not. Instead I see Ashely come out with some pieces of armor in her hands.

"Ruri let me set this alright?" she asks.

Kayla let's go and stands back a bit, staring in confusion.

"What's going on?" she asks.

"I'm uh…getting some custom armor," I answer.

Ashley sets really thin, flexible shoulder plates over my bare shoulders. Then grabs y arms to slide a pair of surprisingly sturdy vanbraces over my long gloves and then covers the area from my knees to my boots in a plate of armor too. It feels light and quite flexible I can still move my arms and legs perfectly and barely feels like it's there.

Kayla raises her hand to her chin and examines my new attire thoroughly.

"Kind of…plain, no?" Kayla says.

"It's not done yet." Ashley replies.

Ashley goes over to the back again and quickly comes out with what looks like a cloak and fur covers.

"You already used the pelt to do that?" I ask.

"Lisbeth may be the best blacksmith in existence, but yours truly is the best tailor," she boasts.

She clips the cloak around my neck and pulls the hood over my head, she makes some slight adjustments as she makes sure the cloak covers the shoulder plates. Then she covers the vanbraces and knee guards with fur sleeves as well.

"These should fit snugly over the plates," she explains, "And with that, I'm done."

She stands back proudly and I remove the hood off my head. I raise my arms and look at my legs.

"It's a bit too much," I huff, "But I like it!"

"It looks pretty nice," Kayla comments, "kind of fluffy, but nice."

"Is that all you need from me Ashley?" Lisbeth asks as she comes out from the back.

"Yo-you!" Kayla stammers.

"Oh…haha…uh, hi," Lisbeth replies.

Lisbeth starts to laugh rather nervously and Kayla jut angrily approaches her. I started the day thinking I would set off to level up jumping. I sigh and with a smile look at Kayla as she pinches Lisbeth cheeks. I guess there are some things better than being able to jump real high.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter (it's a Ruri chapter after all)!

As of the time I'm posting this mangachiaki is yet to get back to me with corrections. I'll apply them once I hear back from her. I do revise them on my own before sending the chapters to her but please remember English is my second language so I apologize for any prominent mistakes you might find in the particular state of this chapter.

Moving on! This chapter I probably had a little too much fun with, it's just some action and overall silliness. Some of you may know who Ashley is, for those of you who don't, Ashley is a minor character in the manga, I think she also appears in the novels. She is a master tailor that is also a friend of Asuna and thus makes her clothing due to her appearance catching this fashionista's eyes. A little bit of Lisbeth there as well. So kind of a lengthy chapter with a lot of fun stuff if you ask me. Hope you liked it.

**BeastZoroark145:** I'm so glad I delivered, thanks for leaving your thoughts on that. **Devilparrot:** I know I'm so sorry! I know I perhaps focus too much on unimportant things but I try to focus first on world and character building before moving on so I apologize. In a few chapters you'll see how it all picks up but I'm so sorry about the pacing. **IC0:** I hope this Ruri chapter was up to your expectations haha.

ANNOUNCEMENT! We have some new sketches of our beloved characters! Please tell me what you think about them if you check them out. You can do so by going to my profile page and following a two step instruction that leads you to my imgur (Since this site refuses to let my link work) with the new sketches. You can see a new Aeri, Regi and Sinna and also the first ever look at Edelwiess, Esra, Ruri &amp; Twyla so please check them out.

ANYWAYS! That is all for today, please leave a review if you like what you read or if you want to say anything really. I love reading whatever people have to say about my story.

I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "The Sellsword"


	40. Chapter 40 - The Sellsword

**Chapter 40.- The Sellsword**

**October/10th/2023**

**Thirty Second Floor of Aincrad – Winterway Settlement**

**Aereth**

I wake up gasping for air, cold sweat and that all too familiar feeling heaviness settles in. That dream again. My little sister again…I couldn't do a thing…again. I breathe the cold morning air in and then slowly let it out as I sit up on my bed. My spear is resting on the side of the bed, the small ruby embedded on the top of shaft just before the blade shines brightly at my face as some sunlight manages to sneak through the curtains. I grab another jacket from the ground and put it on top of the one I'm currently wearing before getting out of bed. I hate the cold, I hate it so much. But in exchange of a little privacy I've taken up house in this dumb tundra settlement. I go over to the window and moving the curtains to the side I see the small settlement thriving with its morning routine. NPCs go out to hunt and the blacksmith is getting all his gear ready. A dog playfully trots around the snow for a few seconds before I hear a knock on my door. A bit annoyed I walk over to the door and open it. No one is on the other side, odd. Confused I'm about to close the door when I hear a voice.

"Mister, hey wait!" someone squeaks.

"Huh?"

Still very confused I look down a little and see a little girl. She smiles at me and tilts her head making her odd pony tail swing to the side as she does. She holds a massive stone, kind of looks like a diamond but there is no way there's something as big as that for players to grab.

"Are you lost?" I ask.

"Not exactly…well kinda…I'm looking for someone," she mumbles.

"I can't help you, sorry." I say and close the door on the girls face.

"Hey!" she complains.

I walk over to my bed and throw myself over it again. I open my arms and sigh as I look at the damaged ceiling of my little hut. The girl knocks on my door again but this time she just lets herself in. I turn my head to her and awkwardly watch her walk in and then she closes the door behind her.

"You are Aereth right? The sellsword, right? I want to hire you," she states and struggles a bit to readjust her grip on the stone she is carrying.

"You can't afford me," I huff and close my eyes, "Wait, how did you even hear about me?"

I sit up again and look around nervously. I get up quickly and walk outside to examine the area around my hut. No red players. What does this little kid want with me?

"A girl with a little dragon told me about you," she says as she almost stumbles out of my hut.

I grab her before she has any more time to topple and she giggles as I help her back up. I just frown slightly and distance myself from her. I'm not that good with kids…not since a while ago.

"You met Silica then?" I ask.

"And Pina!" she says.

"Anyways…as I said, you can't afford me kid, get lost."

"Oh come on, you've helped her before!" she says sounding a bit angered.

"Well yeah, but Silica is not some bratty snot that came out of nowhere assuming she could hire me," I explain, "This might've not been part of her story but I actually offered my services to her."

"You…You are a bratty snot!" she screams and turns her back on me.

I'm a little taken by her comeback…brings me back to simpler times. She reminds me of another person actually, her tone and all. The girl soon realizes she is facing my hut and actually giving her back to the settlements entrance. Trying to look cool she turns around quickly and then she walks past me with her heavy cargo, nudging me slightly as she does. By doing so she almost trips herself but regains balance just in time to walk away with pride. I stare at the little girl as she finally makes her way out of the settlement and then I just kick the snow at my feet. I'm going to regret this…

"Hey wait!" I say loudly.

I see her stop and this gives me some time to walk back into my hut and grab a scarf along with some potions. I take hold of my spear and place it on my back. I bust back through my door as I struggle to put my shoes on and run out of the settlement.

"You are going to help me?" she asks, her eyes flaring with excitement.

"First I answer this," I propose, "Why is it that you want to hire me anyways?"

"I want protection, to deliver this," she says.

She raises the big stone a bit and I can clearly see it is in fact some kind of precious one.

"I need to get a million Col out of deal,"

"What!?"

"A million Col!" she yells.

"What the hell do you want a million Col for?" I ask.

"To help my friends," she says with a smile.

"You are going to get killed," I mutter.

She slams her right foot angrily against the ground and stares at me with a pouty face.

"That's why I wanted to hire you, so I don't get hurt! Red players are more trustworthy than some green ones. Even Silica recommended you," she says and points above my head, "I have the money to pay you, I just need you to come with me to the deal and then get my friends."

"Wait you are going to pay ransom for your friends?" I ask.

"No, we are going to get them out of jail!" she says.

"We?" I ponder, "Also, how?"

"Unless you told me to wait just to tell me no again…" she mumbles.

I scratch my head and just look at the small girl carrying this big-ass diamond. I sigh loudly, deep in the back of my mind I know this stinks of bad idea but I can't let her go alone…can I? A notification pops up and I see the girl has transferred five thousand col to me. Not nearly half of my hiring fee but I guess I can give her a discount. It seems I'm hired for now.

"Fine, I'm Aereth," I say and stretch my hand to her, "But you already know that…"

"I'm Sinna, hehe," she giggles and tries to extend her arm while holding the diamond.

"Uh…let me help you with that," I scoff and take the stone from her arms.

I struggle for a second and briefly wonder for how long she has been carrying this damned thing.

"Why not put it in your inventory?"

"You can't," she says with glee.

I hold the massive thing under my arm and besides her warning I try to put the thing in my inventory. The diamond stays beneath my arm and I hear a slight buzzing sound. I guess she was right. She starts walking further down the road when I decide to examine the cargo. The system says this is a "Raw Extremely Rare Diamond", kind of blunt but I guess it gets the point across. Something catches my attention about the description of the stone.

"Although it looks quite valuable the fact that this is a diamond in the raw greatly diminishes the price in which vendors will purchase this from the player," I mutter under my breath.

Sinna happily skips a little ahead of me. She definitely is a little kid, that or I just haven't been around…happy people as of late. I ponder about asking her if she knows about the rock's description but I decide to keep it for myself and see where this is going.

"So where is this deal going to happen?"

"Floor thirty!" she says.

More of that bad idea stench clouds my mind and I scratch my head as I follow the girl. This is a hunch, there's really just a slight chance I'm right but I'm just going to go ahead and ask.

"By any chance are you meeting a guy?" I ask.

"Yup!"

Another question then…

"Is this guy in a guild called The Seekers?"

"Yeah…hey, how do you know?" she exclaims.

Please don't say yes to this…

"Is his name Laiko?"

"Yes…" she says quietly and stops to look at me.

I pinch a little above my nose and sigh deeply. This kid was about to rip-off one of the most psychotic players I know.

"Listen…you should really try to find out how much this thing is worth before trying to sell it," I suggest.

"Oh I know, it's worth only three hundred thousand and ninety col," she says with a mischievous little smile.

"You little devil…" I mutter, "Your plan from the beginning was to rip that guy off, huh?"

She nods with a smile and puff her chest out with pride.

"It's all part of the plan," she says, "After that we get Regi and Aeri out of jail and we can be happy again."

I can't help but to feel a bit sadden by her last sentence, there's a strong charge of sadness along with her tone.

"How long have your friends been in jail?" I ask.

"A few days now…" she mumbles, "But with my plan we can get them out!"

"I see," I huff.

She resumes walking but I notice her shoulders are down and she just gives off this sulky aura. So what do we have on the table now? A girl, seemingly comes out of nowhere, actually referred to me by the little dragon tamer herself. She is carrying valuable cargo that she plans to use to ripoff a treasure seeking maniac. Two friends, one named Regi, the other Aeri, both imprisoned for a reason yet unknown. These two are surely red players, but for what reason? The girl's cursor is still green, so at least, for her, any violation is out of the question. I should keep asking her stuff but I' not sure how much I could press my luck.

"Why are your friends imprisoned?"

"The Army sent them there, they didn't listen to them…" she says, "They aren't player killers…not anymore…"

"Why do you even hang around with player killers?"

"Because they saved me…and Regi and Aeri they are good people I swear…" she sobs.

"Hey you hired me, so let's get this done, I have a policy to uphold," I butt in.

"Policy?" she asks.

"I do not fail."

* * *

**Thirtieth Floor of Aincrad – Mato Valley**

Now the weather here isn't as punishing. Sporting a single jacket now, it's less cold for sure but it only gets warm with the sun. That said it's cloudy as hell today. This is one of the best floors to sunbathe if you ask me though. The lakes normally have players doing just that anyway. Sinna sits at my feet, I lean against a tree and cross my arms. To be honest I'm growing a tad bit bored. I look down briefly and see that the little girl is tracing her fingers along the dirt. Evil mastermind or not I guess she is just a little kid.

"In all likeliness Laiko will be the first to try and rip you off."

Sinna looks up at me and tilts her head to the right.

"Really?" she asks, looking up at me with puppy eyes.

"At any rate, this is what we are going to do," I say and crouch just next to her, "You'll approach him on your own, if the last job I did for him is anything to base myself on, he will also approach you by himself."

"Then it should be easy right?" she asks eagerly.

"Not exactly," I huff, "He will probably have other people waiting behind him, and he might mention them to scare you. But when he does, you mention me."

"And then you come out all cool and awesome and stuff," she says, sounding quite excited.

"Right, all cool and awesome and stuff," I repeat with a small smile.

I raise my hand a bit and pat Sinna's head quickly. Feeling awkward as hell I retract my own arm quickly and clear my throat as I stand up hastily. Sinna doesn't seem to mind it though, she doesn't even notices how awkward that was. I lean against on the tree and keep a lookout for anything that seems out of place.

I see a man, completely clad in shiny bronze armor and with an unmistakable purple head of hair.

"There he is…" I mumble.

"Hey, how old are you?" Sinna asks randomly.

"Hey, focus…" I mutter, "I'm twenty, now go out there. Be careful and try not to worry too much, I'll be taking care of you, Himari."

My hair stands on edge as I finish my own sentence.

"Himari?" she asks.

I just push the little girl ahead of me and set her on track towards Laiko.

"Nevermind, just go."

The clumsy little girl again manages to avoid falling on her face through an awkward stumble and she walks over to the armored man amidst the scarcely scattered trees. I lean a bit more into the tree and focus on straining a bit since they are bit far. Sadly it's not a skill I've developed a lot but it shouldn't be a problem to hear them.

"Are you lost little girl?" Liako ask.

"I'm…I…I set up the deal with you," Sinna replies.

"Are you kidding me? You?"

"Ye…yeah! So are we going to do business or not?" she says.

As brave as she is trying to sound there is a heavy hint of fear in her tone. Thankfully this is nothing that idiot Laiko can pick up on.

"Where's the diamond?" Laiko demands.

"I uh I have it…" Sinna stutters, "Where's my col!?"

"You cheeky little girl…" I chuckle to myself.

I take a peek and see that Laiko is clearly taken by Sinna's attitude. I smile, it's only natural. I don't particularly like the guy and seeing him lose footing against a small girl is quite funny.

"The diamond, first," Laiko insists and a group of three other players emerge from tress behind him.

I rest my head on the trunk and stand ready for Sinna to smoothly cue me in.

"A-Aereth!" she yells.

I laugh briefly and go out of my hiding spot, diamond under my arm and my spear on my free hand. Within I few seconds I stand behind Sinna and Liako smugly smiles at me.

"Well well but if it isn't the merc himself," he mutters, "And he's got my precious stone."

"And you got her col," I say, "Now hand it over, we have to be elsewhere."

He paces in a small circle close to his guild members and coughs to clear his throat.

"You see, the thing is…I've come short," he says.

"Yeah sure, the last time I worked for you, your guild had over ten million col," I confront him, "And your damned guild is all about collecting valuable stuff, I'm sure this thing is more than worth your petty coin."

He looks irritated and he crosses his arm, trying to look a tad bit more imposing now that I exposed him.

"Also, shame on you, trying to trick a little girl," I add.

Sinna laughs nervously and I turn just in time to see her smile with that mischievous curve in her lips like before. Laiko is a dense guy, dense enough to not see through our ploy and probably…hopefully dense enough to not examine the Diamond on spot and figure us out.

"Fine…" Laiko huffs, "Do I transfer it over to you or the girl?"

"The girl, now send one of those guys to get this," I say and raise the diamond a little.

Laiko nods at one of his partners and he starts approaching me. Meanwhile Laiko brings his menu down and starts transferring the Col over to Sinna. When the other man is right in-front of me I realize I remember him.

"Huh, so you decided to stay with them?" I ask.

"Yeah, back when you were working for Laiko I found my true calling," the man says with a laugh.

This guy, I don't exactly remember his name but as he said, back when I was working for The Seekers this guy was a prospect to join the guild. He was tough but I never thought he would stay with them. I look over at Sinna and see her dismissing a notification on her menu.

"Do you have the col now?" I ask.

She nods with a smile and I hand over the diamond. The poor guy struggles a bit to carry it and slowly takes it over to Laiko. I take a few steps back and place my hand on Sinna's shoulder and lean in close to her ear.

"Be ready to run, just in case," I whisper.

She nods and also takes a few steps back. Laiko doesn't notice our slight movement, he's never been a sharp fellow. He finally gets to hold the stone and briefly admires it for a second. He raises his right hand and I already know something's off. I turn around quickly and manage to swat away a knife coming at me with the pole of my spear.

"Come on, let's get out of here," I huff.

I grab Sinna's arm but she doesn't seem to cooperate with my pulling. She stands rigid on the spot without moving a muscle.

"What's wrong?"

"I can't move…" she whines.

I notice a knife sticking out of her back and quickly grab her small figure to start running. With my left arm under her legs and my right under her back I start running through the scarce forest. I'm fast enough to just run by the bloke that threw these knives at us.

"Did you really get all that col?" I ask.

"Yes," she stammers and I skid around a tree to change my direction.

I turn my head slightly and see about three guys in bronze armor giving me chase. It should be easy to outrun them but I need to be really careful.

"Hang on," I say.

"To what!?"

I reach the end of the area and slide down a steep slope that leads to an open field with tons of bison. These guys aren't particularly agro but if you piss them off you are off to a bad time. The bison are particularly big and hairy. Their hair flows down the ground and you could easily hide behind one as there are tons of them in the field. I pass quite a few of them and then hide behind on that is closest to my right. I set Sinna on the ground and rest her against the fluffy bison.

"Be sure to shout as loud as you can when you are able to move again," I order her as I pull out the knife from her back.

She nods and I dig in my inventory to take out some oils. I grab my spear and coat the tip in the multiple oils.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

"The paralyzer they are using on you," I mumble and finish spreading the oil on the blade of my weapon, "I showed them how to make it, but I perfected the recipe, these will take them out for a while."

I stand up and look down at Sinna. I smile a bit and lean out from the side of the bison a little. I go back behind it and breathe in deeply.

"Shout, when you can move alright?"

"Alright," she answers.

I go out of my cover and run towards one of the guys closest to us. With my running start I drive my spear clean through the man and quickly take it out as I twirl to the side. Swiftly again going into hiding behind another bison.

The man tries to speak but my new recipe is so strong it barely allows him to moan and groan random sounds. I turn right into the tip of a sword and another Seeker staring at me with a smug smile.

"Drop your weapon," he demands.

"Heh, alright," I agree.

I throw my spear towards his feet and the tip just slightly graces his leg. I just move slightly to the right and pick up my spear. The man stands still like action figure, pointing his sword randomly at her I stood a seconds ago. His eyes nervously dart around and I just push him on his back.

"Ok…one to go, probably…" I mumble.

"I found the girl!" A woman yells.

I turn my body around and try to remember where I left Sinna. I jump a little and see a red feather, sawing a little with the wind behind a bison. I run towards the bison and a few steps before getting there I use my spear to vault over the bison. In the air I see a woman with a helmet with that red feather on top of it. She is reaching down for Sinna and I position my spear to poke her in her side just as I fall near Sinna.

"Ahhhh!" Sinna screams as she gets up.

I cover my ears slightly at her high pitches scream and stare at her. She has her eyes close and probably hasn't noticed I'm here. She continues to scream until she finally opens her eyes.

"Ahhhh you are here!" she yells with glee.

"I am, now let's get going," I huff.

We make our way through the field of bison and reach the very edge of a small town. I look back and see the bulky masses of hair obstructing the entire field. The make a funny living maze, and I happen to know how to make it harder. I play around a little with my spear making it twirl in my hands much like a staff. Sinna notices and she giggles a bit, right after that I slap one of the bison's butt with the bottom end of my spear and it groans loudly and sharply. It makes all the others do the same and the start collectively moving around the field in a fit of panic.

"That should give us enough time," I say.

I feel Sinna hugging my side and I feel very inadequate.

"Thank youuuu!" she sings.

"Uh…you are welcome," I mutter as I push her away.

She starts hugging me right away once I push her off, again I push her off and then she pouts. I sigh and open my arms, she jumps to me and hugs me tightly.

"I don't know how safe is this thing where you hug strangers," I joke.

"But I want to hug you!" she says.

"Uh…fine I guess," I reply and grab her to separate her from me, "I'm not particularly fond of it."

I set her down but this time she is just smiling. This small girl is bringing back odd memories I don't really want to be remembering right now.

"We should get going," I huff and walk past her, "We can probably lay low in this town, the last thing they would expect is for us to stay on this floor."

It's a short walk to the main street of the town, there are a few vendors on the street and what I assume to be a really small inn on the other end of the street. I stop at a vendor and buy two sandwiches. I stop myself once the transaction is complete. I did it almost on instinct, barely thought about it. With two sandwiches now in my hands I awkwardly turn around and hand one over to Sinna.

"Here…" I say dryly and once again walk past her.

I go into the small alley between two houses and jump on some boxes to then jump on the roof of one of the houses. I lie down on the tiles and take a bite out of my food. The sky is still a bit cloudy and no sign of the sun piercing those clouds in sight. In the corner of my eye I see Sinna, she sits next to me and eats her food with me.

"Who's Himari?"

I ignore her question and focus on my sandwich. I'm not going to be answering that anytime soon, as soon as I'm done with this little job I'll disappear to my lovely winter wonderland again.

"Aereth?" she asks.

"Yeah?" I reply.

"Who is Himari?"

"No one," I snap back.

"Oh…ok."

The cloud move slowly and beam of sunlight finally graces me. Soon enough the cloud is gone and I feel the full contact of the sun over my clothes. I take off my jacket and spread my arms over the tiles, trying to soak up as much warmth as I can. I sigh in relief and suddenly feel very relaxed. I can hear Sinna eating with her mouth open.

"Hey, have some manners," I say with my eyes closed.

"What?" she says with a mouthful.

"Close your mouth when you eat," I say.

"Sorry," she mumbles.

"So where are your friends?"

This time she takes a while and I turn my head to her and open my eyes to see her struggling to finish off the food in her mouth before answering me.

"In a prison on the first floor," she explains, "In the bla-"

"Black Iron Palace…" I finish for her, "How exactly are you going to get them out of there?"

"I made a deal with a guard, he said if I paid him this much he would let them go," she says.

Another thing that sounds fishy as hell. The Army is very strict when it comes to handling red players and first of all they only apprehend people that are caught doing something bad or people that are considered to be wanted for player killing. Yet Sinna says they don't kill players…at least not anymore.

"Alright, we'll see how that goes," I huff and rest my head back on the tiles.

"Do you think…maybe we could go get them now?" she asks.

"It's too dangerous," I mumble and start breathing slowly.

"But…"

"But what?"

"I kinda want to see them already…" she admits.

I sigh deeply and cover my eyes with my hands.

"So, right now?" I ask.

"Yes…please…"

I take out two crystals out of my inventory and hand one over to her.

"You know how to use this right?"

She nods eagerly and raises her crystal into the air.

"Teleport, Starting City!" she yells.

She disappears from my sight and I just sigh loudly. I stand up and grab my coat as the sun goes back into hiding. At least I got a bit of sun today. I raise my crystal into the air.

"Teleport, Starting City!"

In a flash I find myself in the center of the huge plaza. It's been a month since I last was here and I can only say this place looks worse and worse every time I come back. On top of that really low floors have been getting increased player killer activity. And as I would assume it is, killing is never a good sign of anything. I see Sinna running towards the castle that is easily visible from where I'm standing. She is too impatient for her own good.

I catch up to her with a light run and manage to reach her just as she reaches a small door on one of the sides of the castle. Two Army guards, stand their ground next to this little door.

"You again?" What do you want?" The guard on the right miffs.

"I got the money!" Sinna says.

Both of the guards stare at each other and then burst out in laughter. Sinna looks confused and she holds both of her hands close to her chest. I get closer to her and stand behind her.

"You actually went and got us a million col?" one of the guards asks but then bursts again into laughter.

"But…but you told me that if I did…" Sinna stammers.

The two men continue to laugh at her and there seems to be no sign of stopping. I'm starting to get irritated. Sinna sniffles slightly and takes a step back, she then leans a bit in to me and covers her eyes with her hands as she starts sobbing gently. I place both of my hands on her shoulders and pat her slightly.

"Oh, you are crying?" the guard on the right mocks, "You are gonna cry you little brat!?"

They continue to mock and ridicule Sinna, finally making me grow tired of their stupid voices. I set Sinna to the side and take a few steps forward.

"Woah, haha and what the hell do you think you are going to do?" the one on the left asks me.

"We got your money, are you going to let us through or not?" I ask.

"Of course not, are you stupid?" the one on the right says, "Even if you had ten times what we told that dumb little girl we wouldn't let you through."

"Then I'm one let myself in," I exclaim.

"Like hell you ar-"

I dash in quickly and take hold of the guy in the right, right away a command prompt for him to send me inside the prison appears before him. I take hold of both his arms and force him to kneel, I push him against the wall and with my knee I pin his right arm to it. I dig into my pocket and take out the paralyzing oil. With one hand now free I force him to drink a bit of it to leave him immobilized.

Behind me the other guard approaches and pulls me away from his partner. He pushes me away and I quickly turn around to face him.

"The hell did you do to him? This is supposed to be a safe area!" He complains.

"Safe areas only protect you from weapons," I say with a smug smile.

Sinna comes into view behind the man and goes for his legs. She takes hold of both of them and makes the dumb guard lose balance. He falls backwards and take the chance to pin him on the ground and force him to drink a little of the oil. Sinna struggles a bit to get from under the man but ultimately she frees herself.

"Heh, great job," I say.

"We…we shouldn't be doing this to the army, we need to hurry!" she says anxiously.

"Right."

I take a set of keys from the first man I paralyzed and walk over to the door to unlock it. Surprisingly on the first try I get the right key and turn the knob as I push the door in.

"Go, I'm right behind you," I order.

Sinna runs in and I go after her down a dark flight of stairs. We reach the bottom which is slightly more illuminated. The first holding cells are for minor offenders people who eventually they let out, hopefully her friends are here. Any floor beneath this is reserved for player who've killed a lot of players or have recently been caught killing. I myself spent a few days in the first floor, working for the seekers required me to steal a lot of stuff.

"Aeri! Regi!" Sinna yells.

"Sinna!" I man replies.

Sinna runs to a small cell on the far edge of the room and I follow her quickly. We pass a few players being held in here as well, they stare and yell at us. They must be confused.

"Regi! I'm here! I'm going to get you out!" Sinna explains.

The small girl harshly takes the keys away from me and starts trying every single one of them in his friend's cell.

"Sinna, who is this man?" The person I assume to be Regi asks.

The dude sports a dumb color of hair, red. I mean if you are going to customize at least make it look believable, not that tone of cartoonish red.

"He is Aereth, he helped me get here," Sinna says.

Regi smiles at me and nods, I nod as well at the awkward exchange.

"Well if he helped you I guess he is my friend as well," he says.

I feel the urge to correct him but I better not. Sinna finally finds the right key and the cell opens. Almost in tears Sinna runs to Regi and jumps to hug him.

"I missed you!" she cries, "Where Aeri?"

"She is down there somewhere we need to find her," Regi suggests.

"Why is she down there?" I ask, knowing what it means.

"Beats me man, but we need to find her," he replies.

I decide to play coy and take the keys from Sinna's hands. I walk to the stairs that lead down.

"You two get out of here fast, I'll go find her," I say, "What does she look like?"

"Red hair, lovely attitude, you'll find her quickly," Regi says, "Come on, Sinna let's go."

Sinna nods and they quickly leave the holding cells. I make my way downstairs and find myself in an even darker room. All I see in the dark, inside the cells are orange icons. Floating or moving around in the small holding space.

"Aeri?" I ask to the air.

I keep walking further into the room and get no answer.

"Aeri!?" I yell.

"Why are you yelling my name?" I hear to my right.

I turn instantly and see a girl in gold plated light armor, red hair and a rather bitchy face. I guess it must be her.

"Sinna sent me," I say quickly and start trying the keys on the door.

"Where is she!?" she asks harshly and pulls me close to the bars from the collar of my shirt.

"She is outside with Regi, now let go of me so I can get you out dammit…" I miff.

She let's go of me and the fourth key I try pops her lock open. I pull the barred door open and she dashes out as soon as she is able.

"You are welcome…" I mumble.

"Hey get me out too!" a player screams.

"Yeah don't leave us here!"

"Get me out too!"

I ignore them and go up the stairs, from the bottom I barely see this girl Aeri as she reaches the top of the stairs already. Damn she is fast. After the first flight of stairs I run past the first cell block and then up to the exit. I drop the keys on the paralyzed guards face and give chase to the girl who I just barely see going into a side street. I turn right where she does and I see her fist flying at my face, I duck and grab her elbow to move it away. She grabs my arm to free her hand and throws another punch which I barely mange to stop before it reaches my face.

"Why are you following me?" she asks enraged.

"Aeri!" Sinna yells from behind her.

"Sinna!" Aeri replies and let's go of me.

They both run at each other and just like with Regi they hug each other. Both of them in tears hold each other closely.

"Aereth, you are alright," Sinna says, still clinging to Aeri.

"You know this guy?" Aeri asks.

"He helped rescue you!"

"I see…" Aeri huffs.

"We can ask who is who later," Regi interrupts, "Let's get out of here first."

We all nod at him and run towards the City's floor gate.

* * *

**Twenty Third Floor of Aincrad – Onyx &amp; Wolf – Player Run Inn**

I stand idly by the door of the somewhat crowded inn, Sinna approaches me from the side and stares at me without saying anything.

"Hey kid…so mission accomplished huh?" I say.

"Do you need to leave?" she asks, "I like you…"

"Huh?" I huff, "Well yeah, you hired me, we got your request done. I should be on my way now."

"What if I hired you again?" she asks with beaming eyes.

"Kid you can't afford me," I say again.

A notification pops up in front of me, she's transferred a million col over to me. I smile a little, she is too much like her. Quick on the trigger and always gets what she wants. I sigh and dismiss the notification chuckling somewhat loudly.

"I guess I'll be at your service for a while longer," I accept.

She smiles widely and takes my hand. She drags me through the inn and sits me down on a table next to this Regi guy.

"Hey, what's up?" he asks, looking quite confused kind of funny since I caught him in the middle of his food.

"It seems I'll be sticking around for a bit…" I mutter, "Your girl here, hired me for a while longer."

Sinna smiles on the opposite side of the table and anxiously waits for Aeri to join us. The red haired girl gives me the stink eye as she approaches the table, with a tray of food she reluctantly sits in front of me. I smile wryly and she just "tsk"s at me. There's that attitude Regi spoke about.

"What are you still doing here?" Aeri asks.

"I'll be extending the period of my services to Sinna," I explain.

"Heh…a sellsword in a fucking game," Aeri mumbles, "What fun…"

"Aeri! Language…" Sinna says.

"Oh…ahaha…right, sorry sweetie," Aeri mutters.

The awkward afternoon turns into night and I'm still sitting at the same damn table. Regi seems like a nice guy from what I can gather, he is all about being funny, making people laugh. He just genuinely looks and feels like a nice person. However this Aeri girl is just bitter and annoyed, although Regi told me she isn't usually like that when she got up to get Sinna into bed.

"So are you two like, boyfriend and girlfriend or something?" I ask.

Both of them spit out their ale, most of it falling on my face. Slowly I wipe my face with my hand and they awkwardly start to laugh.

"Him? Nah we are just buddies!" Aeri says nervously.

"We had a thing, kinda," Regi admits.

Aeri throws her mug at his face but he quickly dodges to the side. The wooden mug smashes open on the floor and everyone on the inn turns to see us. One of the waitresses quickly comes over and picks it up.

"Aeri, it's good to have you back," she says, "But we can't have you breaking our mugs every time!"

"Haha…sorry, Berryl…" Aeri mutters apologetically.

"So a thing?" I ask as I turn my buddy around.

"Yeah a thing," Regi repeats.

Aeri flushes like crazy and decides she is totally hiding it by staring at the table.

"Alright, let's leave it at that," I say, "Oh…I wanted to give you guys this."

I go into my menu and transfer five hundred thousand col to each one of them.

Regi again spits out half of his ale and Aeri just looks impressed.

"What for?" Aeri asks bluntly.

"It's what Sinna paid me to stay," I mutter.

"So you are not staying?" Regi asks.

"No I will, but not for the money she gathered to rescue you two," I comment, "She actually wanted to exchange this for your freedom."

"She gathered this?" they both ask in unison.

I nod my head and then they both look at each other.

"That's a very nice thing to do man," Regi says.

"We'll figure out some way for her to pay me, just not with that money," I add.

They both nod and look at me with happy expression.

"At any rate…" Aeri mumbles.

"Welcome aboard Aereth," Regi says.

"Yeah, heh this might just more interesting than freezing my ass off," I huff.

* * *

HELLO! Crysina here!

This chapter was beta-read by me! (I'm funny) Anyways, let's address this real quick. I try to be sort of nice in the way that I express this. cause it already happened with my previous beta-reader Donna Hufflepuff. Mangachiaki has yet to reply to the last email I sent to her, Donna did the same thing she stopped replying for whatever reason. And I mean I respect this and really have no reason to complain. After all beta-reading is done for free and out of the kindness of the heart of whoever decides to do it. But at the very least I would like for them to tell me they don't want to beta-read for me anymore, instead of just never replying again. Heh either way this was a little bit of a rant I apologize. If you think this chapter has a lot of mistakes please tell me and I will try to revise it once more.

Today we have yet another character! HOW WILL I EVER KEEP TRACK OF THEM?! (In a really detailed word document with character descriptions actually haha) Aereth was submitted by none other than **davidholuguin2**. Now I think this is the last of the submissions I'll be taking to set as sort of mayor characters. Because for starters I didn't really plan to take submissions. Like with Owl this things just sort of happened and I found a way to implement them into the story. So by all means if you think you have a character that could make an appearance or stay in my story don't be shy to tell. MAYBE I can work him/her/it in but I'm not sure so please don't get mad at me ; - ; OH MAH GAWD why was Aeri on that second floor of the prison?! I guess you guys will have to stay tuned for the next chapter! Anywho, I know the pacing has been going sort of slow, BUT BOY OH BOY will it start picking up come next week. I hope you guys like it.

A round of applause to **Silvariux **this user gets the 50TH FOLLOWER AWARD! Please dear readers do remember these awards are random as all hell and that you can boast about them in parties where no one will actually know what you are talking about. **IC0**: Uh the door is pretty big? YEAH! (I have never considered the dimensions of the door actually...^^;) I think there's nothing that specific to answer aside from that, glad to see that the support for the totally awesome Ruri is there, because as I've said in the past I actually was not sure about her character.

I think this is enough of me rambling but I will keep going because reasons. SO WE REACHED CHAPTER 40! Wow, 40 weeks people. Have I failed to deliver once? This is genuine question I actually don't remember if I have or not. Personally I think it's sort of cool to have kept this going as long as I have, I'll try not to prolong my welcome too much as I do have an ending in sight but...we still have a bit of ways to go before getting there haha... SO PLEASE if you enjoy my story, stick around with me ok? I would very much love to share this "journey" with you!

As always, if you like what you read, want to say anything or just downright criticize me or whatever. PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW! I will see you all, next week!

Next Chapter: "To Kill Monsters"


	41. Chapter 41 - To Kill Monsters

**Chapter 41.- To Kill Monsters**

**October/13th/2023**

**Forty Seventh Floor of Aincrad - Floria**

**Aeri**

I sneeze randomly for the fourth time and harshly stomp a few nearby flowers into the ground. I wipe under my nose with my arm and like a heaving animal gasp for polen-free air. I seem to have my wits under control but I just sneeze loudly once again. Exasperated I kick another flower and cover my nose and mouth with my hands.

"I'm trying to come up with the animal you resemble right now," Aereth mutters, amusing himself.

"Hey shut up, I didn't know I could have virtual allergies!" I say nasally.

"Well, when you are done killing flowers maybe you can get to killing…other things," he says, that last bit sounding withdrawn.

Unnerved I stare him down. Aereth is a strange man, I would say a bit too nosy but that's exactly why he knows more than he appears to. He doesn't condone what I'm about to do yet he comes along under the excuse that he is doing it both for Sinna not to worry and to keep my back covered. His motives are all too shrouded in mystery for me but I rather not question what little help I'm getting on the matter. Besides I was technically blackmailed into letting him come along. For whatever mysterious reason he knows I've been killing people, and so I have to bring him along. It's not like I can tell Reginald.

"Anyways…" he mutters, "What is your method for tracking these people?"

"A lot of luck," I reply, "I usually hang around a tavern eavesdropping or ask other red players for info."

"I see, that's sounds like something you would do," he says.

"Huh?" I scoff and get close to him.

I pull on his coat and get his face close to mine.

"What is that supposed to mean?" I question.

"Well it's by no means a solid plan nor does it sound like much thought was put into it," he replies.

"'I'll have you know I tota-achoo!"

I open my eyes slowly after that hard sneeze and see Aereth forcing his eyes closed. His eyelids twitching slightly along with his eyebrow. A bit scared I stop grabbing his coat and make some distance between me and him. He brings his hand up to his face and slowly wipes his eyes and mouth, he looks like he is about to rage. Surprisingly he just breathes in deeply and proceeds to without any trace of emotion stare at me.

"So we find a tavern…" he says, his teeth grinding as he does.

"Yeah…" I answer like a scared puppy.

He walks past me being sure to avoid me as much as he can. He even raises his hands in an absurd, exaggerated manner. This whole damned floor is riddled with flowers and petals flow through the air all too beautifully. It's pretty, sure, but I got a runny nose and cutesy stuff has never been my thing. I go after him, making sure to keep my distance. I mean it's not like he would hurt me or anything but I think a little respect is needed whenever you sneeze right on someone's face. We start getting closer to some small buildings and he points at the first without even looking at me.

"That place doesn't allow red players, we'll have to go to the outer areas of the settlement," I say.

He nods and keeps trekking onwards. I sneeze once again and get very irritated. This damn pollen or whatever it is. I equip a scarf and hastily tie it around my face. I'm sure to cover my mouth and nose, it might be a little tight but it'll do. Thankfully it's a bit chilly so having this scarf may turn out to be two kinds of useful. Staring at Aereth's back I notice his attire. He seems to be wearing several layers of clothing and that makes him look somewhat fat.

"Hey…aren't you hot under all that clothing?" I ask.

"You hitting on me?" he replies.

"Pfft…what? No…what!?" I blabber.

"It's just cold, leave me alone," he says.

"Yeah but…"

I slither my way next to him and poke his sides. It feels like he has over three very thick jackets or something. He slaps my hand away and practically growls at me.

"My my aren't you in a good mood today?" I say with a smirk.

"Let's just get this over with, I'm merely tagging along, you do your thing," he says, "And please do it quickly."

"Then let's go in here, this is one of the few red player pubs on this floor," I say while pointing at a small wooden building.

It looks rundown and dirty. This is one of the few instances in which you can judge a book by its cover. It has crappy ale, crappy food and crappy people. Not something that weird to find in an establishment with only red players as patrons. But this one in particular is a shitty place. I've been coming later at night for the past few days, looking for White Snakes. Two in particular seem to frequent the place but I have to make sure they might lead me somewhere and that they just don't come here for the awful food and drinks.

"Ok so once we go inside…" I say but stop myself as I look at Aereth's face.

His stare seems to linger on into nothingness, empty eyes with that very distinguishable hint of anger. Eyebrows dipped into his eyes making up a perfect cocktail that easily spells out "don't come near me". And I can't help but to feel half of his expression is because I sneezed in his face.

"Never mind that whole attitude you got going on is perfect."

He raises and eyebrow and blows air out through his nose as he pushes the door in. Like in a really bad movie the chatter and noise from inside the pub ceases and we have a lot of players suddenly staring at us. Once they realized we all share the same cursor over our pretty little heads they return to their table talk and to eating the subpar food. Still trailing Aereth I make my way to the bar where it just happens to be two stools left open. He takes the one on the right and I sit adjacent to him on the left.

"So what now?" he asks quietly.

"We wait for two girls to show up," I answer.

"Two girls?"

"There are two girls I've been sort of stalking…" I mutter.

"Sort of?" he mocks.

"Fine I've been stalking these two girls for a few days now. They seem to spend most of their time in this place before going elsewhere," I explain.

"I see, and then you follow them and kill them," he says bluntly.

"I try to get more information first…" I grumble, "Well uh…the order depends."

He nods and hails the bar tender. He orders two mugs of Ale, I would like to think the second one is for me but it's not like I expect him to get me something.

"A red player killing red players…" he mumbles, "The stupid icons are not even red they are orange…"

"It's just the people's slang really…orange icons on players is bad news. Often means player killers or thieves…bad people in general," I huff.

"Just thinking out loud…" he scoffs.

"There is some kind of technical subdivision though," I say.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"A red player is used mostly to refer to us, right?" I ask, "People with orange cursors are red players because they are bad."

He nods, he seems to be paying more attention than I expected. The two mugs of ale arrive and surprisingly he slides one over to me. What a gentleman. I take a long sip out of the mug before continuing.

"But the game's system or something does make a separations when it comes to classifying players…" I say quietly, "There's green, orange and red players. We've just chosen to call anyone with an orange cursor red."

"Fascinating theory, what supports it?" he says.

"I well, I've been talking to a friend about it and I got this item…"

"Friend?"

"Argo," I answer quickly.

"Huh, I always thought she didn't have any real friends," he says.

"Wait, you know Argo?" I ponder.

"Everyone who wants information knows Argo," he says smugly, "You mentioned an item."

"Oh right…"

Not really wanting to expose the following item I drag time out in my menu. Clicking random things or checking how much food I have on me I try to delay the inevitable.

"You gonna show me or not?" he asks.

I materialize a red gauntlet over the bar and place my hands over it quickly, trying hard to hide it. Aereth stares at me with a curious look and I find myself breathing somewhat frantically.

"It's in the items description, just read it quickly."

He practically snatches it away from me once I stop covering it and analyzes it thoroughly before even opening the inspection menu. He traces his hands all over the pointy red plating and feels every inch and cranny of the spiky fingers. On the other side it's smooth leather, someone would think it's design to be a weapon with all those spikes on the other side but it's quite the opposite. It's an odd defensive item.

"Abel…weird name for a gauntlet," he comments.

He tries to slide the gauntlet over his hand but a red grid preventing him from doing so appears suddenly.

"What the hell?" he asks.

"Read the description…"

He opens the inspect menu and slowly but out loud reads the item's description.

"The system recognizes this item's owner as the first red player…"

"Keep it down…" I murmur.

"What can you even do with this thing?" he asks as he hands it back.

I grin a little; the perks of this thing are actually quite useful.

"I can stop incoming attacks if I grab the blade or weapon with the hand I equip this on, it completely neglects damage."

"That actually sounds pretty useful," he says.

"It is, but it has a weird…uh…aesthetic downside," I add.

I put the gauntlet over my left hand and as soon as I do I feel a burning sensation across my face and stomach. I close my eyes with a lot of force almost making them water a bit once I open them again. Aereth's eyes widen with surprise and to avoid spitting his ale all over my face he just spits it back in his mug.

"There's a huge scar across your face now!" he says while pointing at me.

"I need to bear the final attacks of the last two enemies I've killed," I say, "And while it doesn't drain health, wherever I placed the final hit burns all the time I have this on…"

A lie…it's actually just the final attack of the last two players I've killed.

"I see…wait, what is that first red player thing supposed to mean?" he asks suddenly.

I take off the gauntlet and put it back on my inventory. The burning sensation disappears and my face and stomach just return to feeling normal.

"Argo and I…came to the conclusion it had something to do with killing players," I admit.

"Christ…" he coughs, "How many people have you killed Aeri?"

"Thirty something…?" I say softly and completely unsure.

"Holy shit what's wrong with you?" he says harshly.

"They were all red players though…" I reply, trying to excuse myself.

"So if we follow your logic, they might or might have not been player killers," he says, getting closer to my face.

There is no denying I might have killed someone who hasn't killed a player, but they were all White Snakes, they were all scum. They all deserved to die. I shake my head wildly, surprised at my own fucked up train of thought, but I keep talking.

"So what!?" I say raising my voice just a bit.

"You've killed over thirty people, even worse you lost track!" he yells.

A few players turn to face us but quickly dismiss us, returning to their business. Killing is not an odd thing to hear around players like these. I refuse to look Aereth in the eye and concentrate on my mug of virtual alcohol.

"I know why you are doing this…or at least I try to tell myself that I get it," he says, lowering his voice finally, "But you are still killing people Aeri, if they deserve it or not…I don't think it's for you to choose."

"That's rich coming from the merc," I hiss.

"I've never killed people for money!" he says angrily, "The one time I've killed…was purely in self-defense…"

His voice takes an odd tone by the time he finishes his sentence. I guess he is not proud of it. I frown to myself and drink more of my ale.

"Besides…you don't know what I've been through…" I say, pouting at myself.

"I know the basics of it," he says, "But I don't think that's an excuse to become a killer."

I "tsk" at him and turn my head and body away from him.

"I guess you are allowed to an opinion…" I grumble.

I can hear him sigh deeply as he orders more drinks from the barman. The two other mugs of ale he asks for this time are surely just for him. I finish my mug and still throwing a bit of a fit slam it against the bar. I rest my right elbow on the bar and start examining the room when I realize my targets have been here all along. Two girls, dressed in white from tip to toe. Their clothes are rather different but both of them wear the same identical white cloak. The one sitting closest to the window has blue hair and the other in front of her sports a stupid shade of purple.

"Is that them?" Aereth asks softy.

"Shut up, I'm, trying to listen," I say and without even looking mange to place my hand over his mouth.

I need to invest more time in straining, but this pub recon I've been conducting doesn't really work because of all the other chatter. Still I manage to grab some snippets of the conversation between the two girls.

"I don't want…I mean I'm ti-…guess you are right-…we should be heading back soon."

In a holy second of grace I manage to hear her partner a little better.

"Yeah we don't want to keep everyone waiting, just let me finish my food," says purple hair.

I whirl in the stool back to my original position and quickly ask the barman for another mug of ale. Giddy like a little child I start swing my right foot.

"So…did you hear anything amongst all the noise?" Aereth asks.

"They'll be moving shortly, and once they do we'll tail them."

We remain in the pub, drinking ale absentmindedly and pretending to like the horrendous food as purple hair finishes her meal. It takes way too long and I grow tired, but I'm not about to leave just now. A little over half an hour passes by and Ms. Blue and Ms. Purple finally take their leave. And that's our cue. They tread slowly through the streets of Floria at first they seem be leading us nowhere.

"Well this is boring," Aereth mumbles.

"Shut up, we are being sneaky," I snap.

"Sure…sneaky."

The HUD quickly warns us that we are officially out of the safe are of Floria and the two girls go start following a river that flows just a few meters away from the settlement. We follow them from far away being sure not to catch any attention. We stick to the outer edge of Floria to make it look like we aren't really following them. The river doesn't run for that long, a few meters down it becomes a rather small water fall that fills another lake.

"Where the hell are they going?" I say to myself.

"You say something?" Aereth asks.

"Shut up," I bark.

The two girls reach the small water fall and jump down into the lake. Reacting quickly I yank my body towards the river and run as fast as I can to the edge that overlooks the lake. Peeking down slowly I'm only able to see the water falling down into the lake.

"What the f-" I blabber, not even finishing my own sentence.

"Hmm, maybe they are swimming?" Aereth comments.

"Like to an underwater cave or something?" I ask.

"Weird deduction, but maybe."

I kneel and place my hand on the very edge of the fall, leaning forwards to get a better look. It doesn't make sense, lakes in here can't be that complex, can they? I ponder silently some more and then focus on the falling water. I squint and focus more. In-between the spurts of falling water I'm able to see a small landing.

"Stand guard here," I order and I jump down.

I make sure to swing my body inside the falling water and after getting thoroughly wet I fall on the landing. Every so gallantly I slip on my footing and fall on my chest. Trying to suppress my own grunt it ends up coming out as a weird whimper. Thank fully the sounds of the cascading water overpowers my own noise. Being careful as I stand up I place my hands on a winding tunnel that goes further inside, away from the falling water. The walls and floor are pretty moist so I should be careful about the noise I make. Further down, steps could echo loudly. Venturing down the tunnel, little by little the sound of the waterfall becomes softer and softer with each step. Every few steps I stop to strain a little, just to make sure no one takes me by surprise when I'm deeper into this weird cave. The stretch is quite narrow, more than two people walking alongside in here should cause some trouble. Both a tactical advantage and disadvantage a bottle neck both means a tight defense and offense. So considering there's always more Snakes I should have a bit of an edge if this goes south.

"Thank god you two are back, I wanted to go out already," a voice echoes.

With three quick inputs I equip my gauntlet on and immediately feel the burning sensation across my face and stomach again. Oddly enough though in a weird surge of adrenaline from the upcoming battle I smile widely. It really gets the blood pumping. I close my eyes, I'm able to hear the two girls I've been following and two other voices. Four Snakes. I tread the last bit of the tight tunnel and finally come out into a dim light. I see five players with pretty little orange cursors over their heads. The two girls and three other guys, dressed in white clothing.

"It would seem I counted wrong," I say somewhat loudly.

"Huh, hey how did you get in here?" asks purple.

"There's this tunnel," I say while pointing behind me, "Also I walked."

"Get out of here before you get in trouble," says one of the guys.

"Me? In trouble," I huff, and laugh a little, "You have that backwards idiot."

The two girls stand in-between me and the three guys, so they are going out first. I draw my sword quickly and drive it through Purple's chest. She gasps for air, sounding both pained and surprised. I turn my head slightly to the side and see the other girl trying to draw her sword. Her blade struggles to get out of its sheathe and I take the opportunity to deal even more damage to her friend. Leaning my body forwards I lift my sword a little, making it climb up to the girl's chest, inflicting a ridiculous amount of damage but she is not dead yet. Why is she not dead yet?

"Die, dammit!" I growl and pull my sword out.

After doing so I kick blue hair out of the way and with a skill slash diagonally at the girl I just finished stabbing. Finally the bitch dies and the burning sensation across my stomach changes to a sharp burning line that crosses over from my shoulder all the way down to my hip. A shiver goes quickly down my spine and I jump on top of blue. I stab my sword right through her stomach and into the ground. My carelessness makes me an easy target for the other three guys as one slashes at me with a puny littler dagger. He stabs it dead center on my chest and I just push myself towards the sharp blade. Even if he had attacked me with a skill he would've barely scratched at my health points. Looking a bit panicked the attacker lets go off his weapon and leaves it embedded in my body. With a quick tug I pull the small blade out and throw it behind me.

"Who the hell is this bitch?" The third guy to the right asks.

"This bitch's name is Cinder, darling," I huff and swing my arm back to retrieve my sword from the girl on the floor.

The sword starts vibrating in my hand and lunge at the guy asking the stupid questions. I drive the sword clean through his gut and then pull it upwards to deal more damage. A bit repetitive but it gets the job done. I pull my weapon out quickly and kick his knee to make him bend over. Doing my biding he drops but the last guy I haven't paid attention to jumps at me. I lift my weapon barely parrying his strike. I take a step back and push a bit of my hair out of my face.

"Broadsword, huh?"

"What about it maniac?" he replies.

"This space is a bit too small for that, you silly little snake."

He just gets a bit more enraged from my taunting and I jump back again to be closer to the wall. He dashes to me and his sword shines as he swings his sword horizontally towards me. I stand still, feeling very relaxed. The attack sound effect sounds off loudly for a second behind me and I see the blade stop but an inch away from my body. Taking a quick glance behind myself I see the broadsword completely stuck on the wall behind me.

"I told you so," I say with a grin and pull him from his jacket.

I bring him close and head-butt him. He staggers back, leaving his weapon behind. I quickly switch weapons to a hammer and swipe with it at his feet. Successfully swinging him off his feet he slams against the ground and not wasting a second I beat his face into the ground with my hammer. After three quick skill hits, his body disappears and the single burning line across my face is replaced by a big messy burning spot. That scar must look ugly, since I bashed his head in.

I feel my hand shaking and I chuckle erratically. Here we go, starting to focus. I look around the room and see the blue haired girl stand up and run towards the tunnel. I make a mad dash towards her but I'm pulled back and slammed against the nearby table. It easily breaks into pieces and I groan as I try to stand up. As I struggle to get on my feet the two remaining guys kick me down and both place a foot on top of me.

"Who the hell is she?" the man that attacked me with a dagger asks.

"Shit, I don't know Vex. She killed Kinta and Drovis," says the other man.

"Your friends had stupid names," I say with a grin.

"Shut up bitch!" Vex yells and changes his foot to step on my face.

I glance to the upper left side of my HUD and see that my health stands at a neat ninety five percent full. I begin laughing loudly and try hard to get up again.

"Dammit shut up!" he yells again but this time attacks me with his little dagger again.

I lift my left arm in a second and grab the blade of his weapon as it's about to touch my face. Instead of going through my hand the blade stops at the touch of my gauntlet.

"What the hell?" Vex's friends says surprised.

I close my hand tightly and with a rather soft pull I take the dagger away from his hand once again. Taking advantage of their jaws currently being on the floor I roll to the side pushing their feet off of me and regain my footing. Feeling confident I dust off my front but suddenly stop moving. I look down and see a knife thickly coated with something sticking out of my hip.

"Grab her," Vex orders to his friend.

The other guy quickly gets behind me and restrains my arms. He pulls both my arms behind my back and holds them together with both of his hands. Vex walks over to the broadsword stuck on the wall and tries to pull it out. He fails several times but keeps trying to recover the weapon.

"Come on, you can do it," I mock.

"Shut your mouth!" the man behind me huffs and pulls on my hair.

A bit pained, my head just gives in to his pulling due to my body being paralyzed. Vex finally gets the sword out of the wall and walks towards me. Without even warning his friend he pushes the sword through my stomach and I gasp for air as I feel the blade go through me. Stabbing constantly eats at my health points but these weapons are too crappy to really do any significant damage. Nevertheless my health starts slowly dropping.

"Man what the hell that almost got me too!" the guy behind me complains.

"Hehe…almost?" I ask.

Finally being able to move a little I walk forwards driving the big sword deeper through me. Awkwardly I manage three quick steps forwards and feel the man behind me complain as the sword goes through him as well. Yet he doesn't let go of me he just grabs my arms even tighter.

"Stop Vex…shit…." He whines.

Vex's about to pull on the blade but I kick him away and purposely trip backwards. We both fall on our back but the impact against the ground deals more damage to the man restraining me than myself. After three seconds the guy dies and I bring my hands in front of me again. I stand up and stretch a little, I chuckle at the sight of the enormous sword sticking out of me. I place both of my hands on the slick blade and slowly pull it out. I rub my stomach a bit once I'm done and sigh out.

"Now, where did your girlfriend go?" I ask as I turn around.

"Fuck you, I ain't telling."

I materialize my sword on my hand and brandish is towards him as he sits on the floor. I get close and place the very tip of my blade on Vex's neck.

"Pretty please," I say with a pouting face.

He swallows his own saliva, I can feel his throat bulging slight as he does from the pummel of my sword.

"If I do, will you let me go?" he asks.

"Sure…"

"We have another camp near Narun on the second floor," he huffs, "Now there let me go…"

I grin widely at him, holding every urge to laugh. The idiot really thought I would let him go. He takes notice of my expression and looks down at the damp floor, accepting his fate. He looks up a little his face riddled with fear.

"What are you?" he asks.

"I'm a monster hunter," I scoff and push my hand a little.

My blade slides in through his neck and he clutches at it to no avail. His body shatters below me and a slow clap starts echoing loudly behind me. A notification saying I got a new item appears but I discard it with one hand as I'm bothered by the sound of clapping. With a quick turn I point my blade in the direction of the clap and see three black-hooded men. Only the one at the center is clapping. I take a step back and get into a better defensive position. They are blocking my exit. They must've gotten through Aereth, I can only hope he is not dead.

"One would say you thoroughly enjoyed that," the man in the middle says.

I stay silent; looking for an opening or something at all that might help me get out of here.

"You weren't as silent while killing these poor…corrupted souls," he says, "Where are my manners? My name is PoH."

"Who sent you here?" I ask softly.

"Oh my," he says, "Would it be that you think we are with these rotten little snakes? What a silly conclusion you jumped to. However, they might, when the time comes, be of use."

"Can't be too careful," I reply.

"That you are right young lady," he says.

I try focusing hard past his cloak, trying to get even the slightest read on his face. Sadly I can only come back with one thing. He looks rather handsome. His voice has this exotic husky tone to it. I don't know whether to feel in danger or at ease. The cursors over their heads are clearly orange but I see no weapons. I feel rather confused.

"So why did you kill them?" he asks, "Our first intention was not to spy on your little…fun time. We merely intended to ask something of these Snakes. But you came along and disposed of them rather quickly. Although, you did let one go."

"Blue escaping was not in my plan." I say.

"I see, you planned to leave no witnesses," he states, crossing his arms, "But we saw you."

"I will also kill you if you stand in my way."

"Feisty, I love it." He says with a fake laugh, "But you see there's a slight problem with your sentence there. You would not be the one killing me. Even if you do drive your pretty little sword through me, I would not be your victim."

"Huh? Why wouldn't you be? I would be the one killing you," I huff.

"No, no young lady, the culprit of that crime would be none other than Kabaya Akihiko himself."

I raise an eyebrow and drop my arms to hang on my sides. What is this guy even talking about?

"I don't think this girl understand your logic PoH," says the man wearing a weird skull mask.

"Why are we even talking to her, we should kill her," says the last man, his voice muffled by a bag he wears over his head.

"Now now, XaXa, Johnny let's not be so crude about this," PoH says, "She might just understand, what I say is merely a universal truth."

"So are you done talking nonsense?" I ask, "I would like to leave."

"First, I would like to talk some more, young lady," PoH says, "Why did you feel so urged to put an end to these players?"

"Because I wanted to," I reply quickly.

"Hehe, now she speaks my language," Johnny titters.

"What's more interesting though is that she thoroughly enjoys doing it," XaXa huffs.

"All the more we have in common," Johnny adds.

They talk and talk but don't move one inch. There's no way for me to get out of here unless I kill them. But they seem dangerous and they give off a worrying ominous feeling. Before I do anything I should think about it deeply.

"Are you really just doing so?" the leader questions, "Killing for sport. I can get behind that. Then again you look way too determined to just be doing it for…fun."

"What of it?" I snap.

"I'm just rather curious," PoH says, "Anyways I'll be sure to not take any more of our time. I would like to offer one thing though."

"Yeah?" I ask, irritated that I can't seem to get out of here.

"Consider joining us, I can see you are quite strong," he says, "Maybe it'll take me a bit to make you understand my logic, but I'm sure that, with time. We'll see eye to eye."

"Heh, what are you? A guild?" I ask.

"No, but we will be, someday," he states, "You can refer to us as the Laughing Coffin for now."

"Thanks, but no thanks," I reply, "I can kill on my own."

"I see, we will leave you to your devices then," PoH says, "Do consider the offer, please."

All but one turns around and start heading up the tunnel. The man I believe to be Johnny stays behind I can only see his fidgety eyes through the bag on his head. For all intents and purposes he looks specially deranged. He bends over a little and takes a small knife from his ankle. He walks closer and flips the knife around, presenting the handle to me. Seeing it a bit up close now I see the knife is thickly coated with a black-ish fluid.

"Strong poison, one of my favorites to be honest, you can throw it or just stab some poor bastard with it," he says, "Best of all is that stab after stab the blade remains coated, it's a quite rare item."

Hesitating for a few seconds I grab the knife with my left hand and examine it with curiosity. He turns around and starts leaving but stops.

"Oh right," he scoffs and turns around, "Have a few antidotes, you see regular anti-poison doesn't work with something as rare like this. These are for you in case you poke yourself or in case you want to…play with someone."

He places five yellow vials on the floor and then leaves, following the trail of his friends. I sheathe my sword and keep examining the odd knife. I twist it around and look at the handle, it's pretty odd. The whole knife is a single piece of steel and the only difference I can make in-between the handle and blade is that the blade is coated with a thick-like fluid. With my right index finger I trace my hand over the blade and accidentally poke the tip of the knife with more force than I should have. The icon indicating that I'm poisoned quickly appears under my name and my HP starts dropping at an alarming rate. I drop the knife on spot and run for one of the vials on the floor. I grab one and uncap it with my teeth and gulp down the yellow liquid. My health stops dropping at twenty percent full and I feel the need to sigh in relief.

"That was close…"

I grab the rest of the vials and put them away into my inventory. While I'm doing so I check the new item I got from killing the Snakes. Yet another drop from killing players, odd. I realize I've acquired another gauntlet much like the one on my left hand, but this one is for my right arm. The description says I've ranked up and I feel disgusted for a second, but that's it, it merely lasts a second. Unlike Abel this new gauntlet "Cain" is a weapon. I equip it and walk back to where I dropped the knife, avoiding the broken table in the progress. I crouch down and pick it up carefully. I store it in my inventory again and head for the tunnel. Aereth is running from the other side, he is dripping in water and seems to be heaving beyond reason.

"Hey, you are ok," he huffs, "Good."

"Whatever happened to standing guard?" I ask as I try to hide my right arm behind me.

"Well I got thrown into the lake for starters," he says, "Did you see those three guys? All dressed in black?"

I nod and he looks behind him in a weird fit of panic.

"We should go back now, I don't want to stay here any longer," he confesses.

I nod and walk with him the waterfall that hides away this little cave. We reach the edge of the landing and I scan around awkwardly. The only way out seems to be to jump into the lake. I push my hand through the falling water and then bring it back to my side.

"We'll have to get you wet again," Aereth says.

"Geez shut up you perv."

"Get your mind out of the gutter," he replies.

"Oh…right, yes, water."

"Anyways, did you find what you were looking for?" he asks.

I stay silent for a second, thinking of how I'm going to lie to him.

"No, I'm at a dead end for now."

"Good, you need to stop killing people," he says and jumps through the cascading water.

"Yeah…" I say and raise my right hand to my face, "right…"

* * *

Crysina Here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter was beta-read by Devilparrot, so thanks to him!

See what did I tell ya?! DIS SHIZZLE IS GUNNA GET CUHRAZY! (The aforementioned story shall get completely off the rails in regard to it's awe factor.) Anyways, some of you were probably thinking among these lines. (hopefully) I sort of set up for it but I fear I might've been too subtle. Either way moving on, before a certain particular gets his/her panties on a twist (not any of you reviewers so far but a certain individual that cherry picks small parts on my story and PMs only for me to link him to wiki articles to justify myself) Crysina does her homework and SAO's system actually categorizes players in three categories. Green, Orange and Red. Red players have killed a lot of players hence why Laughing Coffin only becomes recognized as red guild after it's members have killed lots of people! (And this is not even until later in the general timeline of the story) I'm sorry about this but I'm tired of responding to whoever this guy is because I legit try to respect SAO's universe and rules. I'm super sorry, just wanted to get that off my chest!

**BeastZoroark145: **I might just answer your question in a little thing that'll be starting the coming week, so you guys get ready for a small announcement! Don't hold me to it though I'm still thinking how I would implement this thing. I'm being super vague sorry but be kind of sorta excited. **IC0: **Totally super psychic you are now thinking about what will happen in the next chapter, I'm that good, should be in a circus. I'm sorry about the typos! hopefully this chapter has fewer or none. **Silvaruix: **Considering you totally saw through the structure of my story in this particular arc I have a feeling you are going to like next chapter a lot. **Devilparrot: **He is a he, man dude boy. Yes. **rfpaulino: **WAS YOUR HUNCH CORRECT? CAPS!

So what do you think about the story so far? I also if you don't mind leaving a review or someway of letting me know, who is your favorite character and why? I would like to know. And as always if you like what you read and yadayada please leave a review! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Foxes"


	42. Chapter 42 - Foxes

**Chapter 42.- Foxes**

**October/25th/2023**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

**Owl**

Time never stops, nor does it wait for anyone. It moves on whether you are ready or not. This is both good and bad in a way. Time helps all wounds to heal, but it also takes away. It takes away what we hold dear, it takes away those brief moments of happiness. But as said it also heals, it passes on so sad moments aren't everlasting. It passes to give way to happiness. Time is an odd beast: it's cruel, fast and devastating, but it's also fair and forgiving.

It's been a while since Al made this guild, even longer since I joined on that fateful day I found them in that forest. Back then we were a smaller group, just Elina, Kayla, Daath, Aeri, Al, and me. Now we've had some people come and go. Some have stayed like Ruri, other have gone like Aeri and Regi. But I keep them in my heart; I keep everyone in my heart. My brothers, Kato, Daath, Regi and Aeri. I think about them every day. I like to think it keeps me sane but it could be quite the opposite.

I've been staring into space for a while now, this happens every once in a while I guess. Everyone gets lost in their thoughts anyways. I reposition my fingers on the knife and cut a tomato into fine slices. Our expert chef Esra dices an onion into tiny pieces with great speed next to me. I know how to cook and quite well, I'm just not good at cutting ingredients.

"Come on big guy, you are slacking," Esra jokes.

"Hah, sorry I'm just no good with knives," I answer, "Now, if we are talking cakes, I'm quite confident on that skill of mine."

"Hmm, maybe one day you can bake us all a cake," she says with a smile.

"I will, be sure of that."

Helping Esra with chores has become a weird hobby of mine. We work well together and it's not like anyone else really offers to help her, there's the usual day when she is lazy and that's alright. As a matter of fact, when she's lazy is when I like her the most. She takes off that silly maid dress and lies around in the sofa near the entrance of the building. I've been waking up early with her every morning for two months now. We clean the house in the early morning. We mop, dust off some things and even scrub down the kitchen if it's completely necessary. The very few birds that inhabit Barrowdell can be heard only early in the morning, they chirp with energy and it's just nice to hear them before the streets get crowded with NPCs and players. As a nice plus to all of this is the music at this hour. I'm rather fond of it, it's particularly nice. As soon as the sun peeks into the house, hitting the hard wood floor, a harp plays slowly. It gradually speeds up, little by little as if the instrument itself were waking up.

"So what are you cooking this morning anyways?" I ask, finally slicing the last bit of the tomatoes.

"Mexican scrambled eggs," she says as she moves with the sounds of the harp.

"What are those like?" I ask.

She grabs a bowl and cracks about nine eggs inside it. With chopsticks she mixes the yolks and whites inside the bowl. She hums and tilts her head from side to side, keeping up with the tempo of the music. I smile as I watch her, she truly enjoys doing things like this for some reason.

"They are just scrambled eggs with tomato, onion and green pepper, I hope everyone likes them," she says with a smile.

"Sounds good. Where did you even learn how to cook Mexican food?"

"It's easy when your mother and father are chefs," she explains.

I walk over to where she has the onions, and peppers piled up and drop the tomatoes in a similar little pile like the others. I pull one of the stools closest to me and sit over it comfortably.

"Huh, do tell," I murmur, "If you don't mind that is."

She stops mixing the eggs and in a neat stream she pours them over the hot pan. She looks at me, she is thinking about what I just asked her to do. She grabs a moist piece of cloth and quickly wipes her hands. She pulls a stool as well and sits in front of me but close to the cooking food.

"I think this will be a first for me…" she mumbles.

"Well you don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

"No, no, it's not that, I think I just haven't opened up to anyone about my real life…like at all," she says with a giggle.

"I see," I say and cross my arms.

She leans a bit and grabs the cutting board with the onions, pepper and tomato. With the knife placed next to the ingredients she pushes the little piles of diced ingredients into the pan. She reaches for the chopsticks again and with her left hand slowly scrambles the ingredients.

"I guess even then there's not much to say…" she mutters, "As far back as I can remember my parents have always been professional cooks, they work together and they even own their own restaurant."

She says this with a smile; it is obviously a happy set of memories. Even while telling me about herself she diligently keeps stirring the food in the pan, to a beginner's eye it would seem like she is not paying attention to either activity but she is more than invested in both. She laughs for a second, maybe a bit louder than necessary.

"I used to be so fat," she says and laughs some more, "I always ate all kinds of pastries and sweets they made for me. I remember that since I was nine I got really interested in cooking as well. And well, what better situation to learn than when your parents live off cooking?"

"Must've been fun, huh?"

"Well it was…but at the same time it wasn't," she explains.

"Really? How so?"

"Well, it was hard to catch them at home, because they were always working until pretty late," she says, "Once I told them that I wanted to learn how to cook like them they got quite serious about it."

I nod at her to go on, though, starting to feel a bit uncomfortable, I shift a little in my seat to lean on the counter.

"I started working in the restaurant whenever I got out of school. The first months I was stuck washing dishes or taking out the garbage," she explains, "It was quite a while before they let me into the kitchen. And when they did, they were so demanding. I needed to cut things this way, pour this like that, arrange this just so. There was little room for error."

"Well, I guess that means they were passionate about it, huh?"

"Maybe a little too passionate," she says, "I mean I was more harshly punished when I made a mistake in the kitchen that when I got bad grades in school."

"I can see how that would be uh…weird."

She nods and grabs the pan out of the fire. She stands up and heads for the door that leads to the foyer where the table is. Following, I find that the table is already neatly set with dishes, knives and forks. Nine dishes for nine people, but someone is sure bound to miss breakfast. She puts an almost equal quantity of food in every plate and then sighs heavily.

"I mean, it was great learning how to cook, but I guess I could've done without the harsh comments," she says with a smile, "But I guess that's about it, not much else to say."

"It's interesting though, I think it's nice to hear about how your life was, you know before all this," I admit.

She blushes slightly but then shakes her head.

"Tomorrow is your time to share a story, alright?" she demands.

"Haha, sure."

She goes back to the kitchen and seconds later she comes out with a pitcher of coffee and another of orange juice. She sets them on the table and then gets glasses from a cabinet next to the kitchen's door.

"I'll go wake everyone up," she says and heads for the stairs.

I take my usual seat, third chair to the left on the side of the table that faces towards the kitchen. I sit down and stretch slowly as I wait for everyone to come down. I find myself in mid yawn when Hotoka walks in through the front door. She is covered in mud and her armor is damaged beyond recognition. Her usually tied up hair is everywhere, sticking out in all directions due to the hardened mud on her face, and she seems ready to strangle the first person who speaks to her. Behind her walks Siren, awkwardly shifting her weight from side to side; she is also covered in mud, and she seems to make Hotoka look cuddly. She truly seems the displeased about it. Shortly after Twyla comes in with Eddelwiess, sporting the same kind of look as Hotoka and Siren, though seeing her covered in dirt and other things is definitely more of a usual occurrence. She gets off that pet of hers and forces it outside.

"I'll clean you later dummy, but you can't be in here right now."

"Good morning?" I ask hesitantly.

"Morning…" Hotoka grumbles and quickly goes past the stairs and into the building's baths.

"Uh…ah…morning," Siren huffs and speeds up to the baths.

"Morning Owl!" Twyla sings with a smile.

Twyla follows Hotoka and Siren into the baths and I chuckle slightly to myself and wait for everyone to join me at the table.

* * *

"Thanks for your help, lately," Esra says as she washes the last of the dishes from breakfast.

I neatly finish placing the last knife in a drawer and turn my head slightly to look at Esra.

"It's nothing, you seem to sort of have your hands full sometimes. Better if I help, right?" I say, "Besides it's perfect cover for what we've been doing."

She nods and stops running the water in the sink. She dries off the last plate and puts it along with the others in a cabinet close to the door leading out of the kitchen. She closes the cabinet and then drags her menu down. I do so as well and change my usual lounging clothes to tight fitted leather armor. Esra's maid outfit changes to a black set of leather armor. She stretches a little and equips a white fox mask. She doesn't have it pulled down, just letting the mask rest atop of her head. I do the same, leaving my mask in a similar position. She locks the door to the kitchen and I head over to the corner where a small trap door is covered by a mat. I grab the mat and pull it away. I look back and see Esra nodding at me as she finishes locking the door. I pull on the door and go down into the small passage way.

"Do we continue where we left off yesterday? I was left unsatisfied." Esra asks as she jumps down next to me.

"Heh," I laugh to my own dirty mind.

"With the information we got! Geez, Owl!"

"Anyways, yeah, if they were doing anything of importance, they should still be near Urbus."

"Shouldn't we bring some weapons then?" she asks, "I think today might just be the day."

"Do you plan on killing someone today Esra?"

She becomes silent and dodges my eyes.

"Well no, but what if we finally find him?" she says.

"Then we take note of it, just like we've been doing," I clarify, "I hate the guy as much as anyone here but we are not killing him."

"Master would…" she mumbles.

"Exactly the reason why we haven't brought Al in any of our little adventures."

She nods slowly and then closes the trap door above her.

"To Urbus then," she says.

I pull down my mask and turn around to follow the narrow track of the small tunnel. A small drop puts us in a sewer and trekking a few meters south should set us right below Barrowdell's floor gate. I place myself under a manhole cover and jump up. I manage to push it up and to the side. I jump once more to pull myself out. Crouching quickly I grab Esra's hand and pull her up. She kicks the cover into place and we move towards the floor's gate. Almost in perfect unison the gate's menu appears before us and we select the second floor of Aincrad. In a quick flash we are transported to the main settlement of Urbus. Mostly barren aside from a few NPCs Urbus is a very quiet city.

"We should investigate the last area where we saw them," I say.

"Twenty minutes west, rundown inn on the outskirts of Narun," Esra states.

"Correct, if they were there yesterday there might be a small chance they might still be," I huff and start walking down the road.

Esra follows closely and drags her menu down to send me a party invite. I accept as soon as I'm prompted and her name appears below mine. I take a small flute out of my inventory and play it as we take the fast way out of Urbus. The sound of hooves becomes louder by the second and soon enough a horse comes to a full stop in-front of us. I climb on and offer my hand to pull Esra.

"This thing is still too weird to me," she mutters, "Just play a flute and he appears…"

I kick the sides of the horse and set our course towards Narun. I laugh a bit at Esra's comment and she pokes my sides.

"What's so funny?"

"Esra we are in a video game," I say.

"Well, yeah but…well ok…" she gives up.

The twenty minute walk to Narun is reduced to a quarter of that time in horseback. My heart races a bit and I would like to think that Esra's is too. We've spent a few months now trying to track down the White Snakes, and just yesterday we were able to find some kind of base of operations. From what we can gather the Snakes have been growing in numbers, swiftly too. They've also been settling in multiple floors at once. They've been kidnapping people and collecting ransoms. Not to mention stealing goods and even just killing players for the sake of killing players.

"What about that other person?" Esra asks as we make our final approach.

"The one we've heard Snakes have been worrying about?"

"Yeah, whoever it is…seems to be hunting them down…" she says.

"Well less work for us," I comment.

"But…this person just gets wind of them and goes to massacre them…" Esra says, a heavy hint of worry in her tone, "I just hope we don't stumble with him…whoever he is, sounds like some sort of psycho."

"We'll just stay out of the way, like we have been doing," I explain, "We are just collecting info."

We arrive to the rundown, almost destroyed town at the outskirts of Narun. As far as the backstory goes this little town used to be Narun before elves attacked. Now it's just some destroyed piece of scenery that even NPCs avoid. I get off the horse and Esra does the same.

"They had a guard here yesterday."

I look around the area thoroughly a few boxes around a camp fire are destroyed and a sword lies on the ground.

"You sure?" I ask.

"Yes, they had a guard here and another two closer to the inn," she says.

I crouch down and look at the wood of the camp fire. This game tends to be quite thorough so from what I can make sense of this fire has been out for quite a while. I grab the sword lying on the ground and press the examine command over it.

"This thing is player made…" I mutter.

"Probably stolen," Esra says, "I can't see anyone else close to the Inn."

"Why leave it here though?"

I stand up and focus on the inn. She is right, the two guys posted at the entrance yesterday are not there anymore. We need to be careful.

"Maybe they are in some kind of meeting?" I ask.

"Always a possibility, but I doubt they would leave this place unguarded. Especially with what Argo said."

"Do you think it's true though? Have the Snakes become so large that now that The Army itself is trying to lock them up?" I ask.

Esra looks around curiously and gently adjusts her mask.

"I wouldn't be surprised to be honest," she says.

To think that these idiots have become that much of a nuisance. If that's the case, we are treading a far more dangerous ground than I thought we did. And so is this murderous vigilante.

"This might be a trap," Esra mutters.

"If so, we are far too deep into this mess to turn back."

She nods and further tightens a strap across her chest. She begins walking towards the destroyed inn building and I follow her.

"Escape routes?" I ask.

"Three once out of the building, I'll think about ways out from the inside when we step in," she answers.

I smile and push air through my nose. The mask in-front of my face makes it so it bounces off down to my lips and I just smile further. Esra is probably the most efficient person I've ever worked with, or ever will. I place my hand on the door leading into the inn and stare through a big hole just next to the door. Empty.

"Do you hear anything inside?" I ask.

She places her ear on the door and stays with her head against it for a few seconds.

"Nothing, not a peep…" she mumbles.

I push the door open and sneakily walk in. Esra cautiously steps inside as well. The charred floors and walls creak loudly with every step we make. Not even if I try my hardest to not make a sound, the structure of the whole building isn't favorable for us. Chairs and tables that stood up yesterday are now scattered across the inside. Some broken to pieces others simply cracked or toppled over.

"Do you think they left?" I ask.

"Always a possibility…" Esra mutters, "But…"

"But?"

"Maybe that player killer?"

"No way, one person can't take all these guys on."

Esra looks around and points out several things with her hand. It starts to become more apparent. Random weapons lie on the floor and smashed furniture just makes it look like some kind of battle took place here.

"Then we are too late…" I say faintly.

Esra raises her hand quickly. I gesture I've grown to understand as "shut up".

"I hear something," Esra states.

"Talk to me," I reply.

"It's…" she says as she tilts her head.

She paces around a bit and then stares at the ground.

"Below us…" she says.

"Look for a hole, trap door, something," I order and begin to search myself.

"Here!" she says.

I go over to her. On the corner of the room there is a deep hole that leads down in a straight line. A flimsy ladder is attached to the side. Esra nods at me and jumps in. I wait a few seconds for her to touchdown and then jump in myself. As soon as I touch the ground Esra gets close to me and starts whispering in my ear.

"There's two girls in a large room," she murmurs, "They must be close but we need to be careful."

"You got all that from just hearing?" I whisper back.

"My straining isn't that high. There's only one door here and two voices, both female. Both voices are bouncing loudly in echo. It's common sense, Owl. Besides, even you should be able to hear them now."

She is right; I hear two voices, both sound like girls and they seem to echo quite loudly.

"Teach me, oh master…" I mutter playfully.

I only see her white and red mask but I'm pretty sure she is smiling at me under it. I place my back on the wall and Esra moves herself opposite of me. There's no light in this small tunnel, the only thing visible is the door with a crack of light shining under it.

"I…I remember you. Y-you are that crazy Cinder girl…" a voice whimpers, "I found out you are an arena fighter…what the hell are you doing outside your dumb arena?"

Both Esra and I exchange a quick glance and we get closer to the door.

"As it turns out I also hunt monsters outside of it," another voice answers," Now, I can do this all day, and I will only stop once you tell me where I can find more snakes!"

The door is shut tight and reaching out with my hand I tug on the handle. It moves a little but Esra places her hand over mine to stop me from making any noise. There's something about the second voice…it almost sounds familiar.

"Tsk…you are not gonna say anything? Idiot…" the voice says.

No way.

I tug on the door again making it creak somewhat loudly as I do. I step inside and feel as Esra tries to pull me back. She slows me down but not enough to stop me from coming in. Both of us now stand in-front of a girl, tied up to a chair and another standing up in front of the bound girl. Red locks of hair flow down her head and make a shocking contrast with her gold plated armor. Alerted, she turns around and I recognize her face just like I did her voice.

"Aeri…" I mumble to myself.

"Who are you two!?" she demands and proceeds to stand behind the tied up girl.

With weird spiky gauntlets she takes hold of the girl's neck and threatens to hurt her.

"You are with the snakes, right?" she asks and begins to laugh, "Oh bet you are…you've come for your little friend here."

The girls bound the chair begins laughing as well. She laughs louder sounding, desperate. She lifts her head, she looks tired. Just how long have they've been here.

"Do you think I'm that important to this guild?" the girl asks.

"Then who are they!?" Aeri asks as she pulls on the girl's blue hair.

"Hahahaha! I don't know you crazy bitch but I hope they are here to kill you!"

"I see, you are with those other crazies, the laughing co-"Aeri replies.

"We are not here to do that," Esra interrupts sounding disturbingly different than usual.

Aeri fixes her eyes on us and points her spiky hand at us. Her fingertips begin to shine brightly. Just what kind of weapon is that thing?

"Then what are you doing here?" she asks.

I desperately turn my head to Esra and then back at Aeri. I'm not good at changing my own voice so I'm not about to speak.

"We've been investigating the White Snakes for a few months now," Esra explains, "Just yesterday we found a group of them had settled here. We were planning on further surveying the area."

"Well I apologize for being the party pooper, but they are all dead, all twelve of them," Aeri says with a wicked smile.

This is not the girl I knew…This is not the Aeri I know.

"She killed them all…and she's been torturi-"

Aeri punches the other girl across the face and then kicks her torso. Toppling the chair over, she makes the girl grunt as her back hits the ground.

"Don't speak out of turn; that's rude," Aeri says in a mocking tone

I reach up quickly for my mask. I need to take it off. A hand behind me prevents me from doing so. Esra is now holding my mask in place and quickly tightens it further.

"Not yet," Esra whispers.

She steps to the side next to me and makes a slow approach towards Aeri.

"So you've been interrogating this girl?" Esra asks.

"Or at least trying to, but she refuses to talk. Although I've yet to try a new method," Aeri replies.

Aeri pushes her hand into a pouch in her waist and takes out a slick looking silver knife, it's thickly coated in some black looking fluid. Aeri bends over to pick up the chair and harshly sets the girl back up. Without warning she drives the knife through the girl's chest and crouches just in front of her.

"This is a very special poison, it's quite deadly as you can see," Aeri explains.

I try to step in but once again Esra gets in my way. She stops me and pushes me back. The girl begins shaking and tries to break free from the chair.

"My…my health!" she yelps.

"I'll give you the antidote if you tell me what I want to know!" Aeri yells.

"We need to stop her," I say quietly next to Esra.

"We need the information as well," Esra says.

"Not like this…" I mutter, "Not like this."

"Ok ok!" the girl shrieks, "We have another base on the twenty fifth floor! Near the dungeon!

"Now was that so hard?" Aeri teases.

"Give me the antidote! Now! I told you what you wanted!" The girl begs desperately.

"Right, right," Aeri answer and takes a small yellow vial with her hand.

The girl's eyes brighten up as she sees the vial and anxiously makes the chair move towards Aeri. Aeri giggles softly and proceeds to crush the small vial in her hand.

"Oops…" she says.

"No!" I huff and step forwards to try and free the girl.

I take out an antidote crystal and place it on her lap as I try to undo the restraints on her hands.

"It won't do her any good…it's a special poison," Aeri explains calmly, "Only I had the antidote…and I doubt she'll live three minutes to see the effect wear off."

The girl in-front of me stops her struggle completely and hangs her head. I look up at her and see a faint smile on her face, followed by a tear rolling down her cheek. Her body disappears before my eyes and my crystal bumps off the chair as it falls.

"No…" I say.

"Are you really going to mourn a scumbag like her?" Aeri asks incredulously.

I stand up slowly and remove my mask, keeping my back towards Aeri.

"I mourned you…" I answer slowly.

"What…?"

I turn around slowly, feeling scared and sad at everything Aeri just did.

"Owl…" she says, as though she couldn't believe my name coming out of her mouth.

She turns around frantically and sees Esra as she removes her mask. Aeri holds her hands up to her mouth and gasps in surprise. She turns again towards me, her eyes wide and solely fixated on me.

"I…I..." she stammers.

"Is this what you've been doing?" I ask, almost whispering.

"Owl…let me explain I…"

"I don't want to hear your excuses!" I scream, tears beginning to roll from my eyes, "You even boasted about it! You killed thirteen people, and…and that's just today! You are no better than those that killed my brothers!" I trail off, trying to maintain some semblance of composure.

"Have you killed many others Aeri?" Esra asks softly.

"I have to go…" she mumbles slowly.

Esra steps to the side and not wasting any more time Aeri dashes out of the underground room. We stay still, silent; there's nothing to be said. A minute or so goes by and then I replace my mask. Esra stares at me, her expression a sad one, but ultimately she also covers her face.

"Do we tell Master? Just this once?" she asks.

"This never happened Esra," I answer flatly and march past her, "Recon revealed that there might be another outpost on the twenty fifth floor."

I turn to her for just a second. I need to see her nod.

"Right…recon," she nods.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Beta-reading for this chapter is the conjoined efforts of DragonofAnnoth &amp; Devilparrot!

Ugh I'm about half an hour late with this update and I'm really sorry about that. I was up kind of late and ended up oversleeping, I was even doing anything interesting I don't know why that ended up happening. On top of that my computer took literally 15 minutes to start up and I was freaking out. Anyways as Much as I know you guys thoroughly enjoy me talking about my life let's move on. This chapter had a lot of versions at first, I wanted to dwell deeper into Owl's character but was unsure of how to do it. At one point this chapter involved Owl and Elina talking about their lives and how "unhappy" or "happy" they were with their current situation. Anyways after three complete rewrites this is what I ended up with and I think it fits more the flow of coming chapters. So please tell me what you think about Esra's and Owl's little secret adventure. And see! I told you stuff would start to get super interesting! (Or at least I hope so, I can't really comment on my own writing that would be sort of lame haha)

**Silvariux:** The same thing happened with IC0 I kept writing the username wrong I'm sorry! So anyways, was this what you were sort of expecting? If I'm honest I think all of you will start to see Aeri in a whole different light from now on. **rfpaulin: **I know right about time! **IC0: **I wa sunsure of how to bring LC into the mix but I really wanted them to be there, since I think the same, PoH is far more interesting to me than XaXa in GGO. **BeastZoroark145: **It's seems all roads lead somewhere, now the question, how long will Aeri stay on this one?! **Devilparrot: **I'm honestly surprised you like Regi, I mean I like him myself but never thought he would appeal for the reason you stated haha.

As for the thing I told you to please not hold me to last week. I was planning on adding little chapters at the end of regular chapters to further expand the story and most just add funny or entertaining little stories about the lives if the the characters in SAO. BUT THEN I REALIZED! Maybe you guys don't even want to see this. Then again maybe you do, so please, could you tell me in a review if you would like to see little chapters at the end of regular ones? They might not be there all the time but I think it would be fun to show a bit more of characters in little drabbles like that. Either way, as always, if you like what you read, want to criticize or anything of the sort please leave a review!

I'll see you all next week! Hehe and oh boy will you guys be eager to get to next Sunday.

Next Chapter: "The White Snakes"


	43. Chapter 43 - The White Snakes

**Chapter 43.- The White Snakes**

**November/1st/2023**

**Fortieth Floor of Aincrad – Coldview**

**Alshep**

"Master, please, don't do this!" Esra begs as she comes out of the gate behind me, "Don't hurt Argo, she has nothing to do with this!"

"You fucked up Esra, whatever happened to never disgracing that uniform!?" I shout.

I shove her away from me, but she only stumbles slightly before she gets back onto following me. As diligent as ever I suppose. She begins pulling at my arm and trying her best to stop me.

"Please, please!" she says, "I should've told you earlier, but this is no way to go about it, please!"

I stop and turn to look at her. Snow is gently falling on both of us, but I'm not about to be gentle. I grab her hand and tear it away from my sleeve.

"You saw Aeri…you were tracking down the Snakes! With Owl of all people! For months now! And just now you decide to tell me!?"

"It was supposed to be kept between me and Owl…but I thought it was important that you knew something at least…"

"Even worse…two of the people I trusted the most! Lying to me for months!" I scream.

"Please Master Alshep, stop and think about this!" she pleads.

I turn around with a dismissive gesture; I'm just done listening to her. I walk through the snow covered settlement. Looking for a rat in particular, it should be easy, after all she agreed to meet me here just minutes ago. Just a matter of looking in the right shit hole. She pokes her head out from in-between two houses and with a smile beckons me. I only regret that I will erase that smile in a few seconds. She hides back in between the houses and as soon as I'm able I grab her neck and pin her to the wall. Not taking any chances I also pin her left arm against the hard surface and get right in her face.

"Al, what the hell!?" she chokes.

"You knew! You fucking knew!" I shout.

"Knew what, dumbass?!" she chokes out.

"That Aeri has been killing White Snakes, you knew she's been tracking down Klaus!"

Esra arrives behind me and though I can't see her, I can clearly hear her gasp at the scene unfolding before her. She attempts to grab a hold of me but I switch to the opposite wall, practically throwing Argo in the process.

"Gah…yes, I knew! The Aeri thing is fucking new, Owl and Esra told me a few days ago about the identity of the player killer!" she admits, "Your dumb ass has a few seconds till the security system kicks in; you can't do this in a town."

"You are going to tell me where Aeri is now!" I pull her back and slam her into the wall again, just for good measure. "Where did you last see her?!"

"If I do, you'll never hear from me again," she threatens.

"I don't even care, you god damn rat. Where is she?!"

"Master, please stop!" Esra begs.

"Last I heard she found out where Klaus is," Argo says, "Aeri should be heading there soon."

"Where?!" I yell.

She winces. "Tenth floor, they've settled in a cave nearby the Thousand Snake Castle. Now let me go," she says.

Just now I notice she had her free hand hovering over the option that allowed her to send me to jail. Surprised I let go off her left hand and stare at her for a few seconds, feeling very confused. She could've sent me there any time, but she was waiting for something. She was waiting for me to stop… She clutches at her neck and swallows.

"I respected you, dammit…" she says, her voice almost sounding tear jerked.

"I…I…" I stutter, realizing I just hurt a close friend. Dropping her, I slowly back away, but she just lands lightly on her feet and follows.

"I'm done with you, and your damn problems, so don't count on me from here on out," she says, definitely close to crying now, "I hope whatever you have planned was worth this!"

She gets on her toes and spits in my face, but I don't even try to block it. Her shot lands right below my eye and she disappears from my sight as she runs away. Dumbfounded, I don't even turn to watch her go, I just stare at the alley wall. Small droplets of ice cold water form as the snowflakes melt on my face. I shiver slightly, the weather giving me a kind reminder I'm not exactly in the clothes for this kind of situation.

"Master…" Esra says quietly.

Turning gently I see she is holding a black coat. She wears a coat herself now, and strange, small details pop out at me. It's a particularly bright one, blue, covered with fur on the ends of the sleeves. I'm losing track of the point here… She takes a step closer and with both hands holds the black coat towards me. I take into my hands and I feel worse than I did seconds ago. As a final punt to my self-esteem, she cleans Argo's spit from my face with a handkerchief.

"You are always looking after me…" I say with a small voice.

"And will continue to do so, Master," she replies.

"Why?" I ask, "I'm…I'm a horrible person, probably a worse leader."

I put on the coat and close it from the front, it feels nice and cozy. It fits me perfectly, just as expected from Esra… I turn my back on her, unable to look at her for a moment.

"I still think you'll lead us somewhere great," she says, her voice not even wavering for a second.

"If I'm gonna do that…" I say, turning to her, "We need to set some things straight."

I beckon her to follow me and start heading out the way I came in.

"Esra please tell everyone to gather at the house," I order.

She nods right away and brings up her menu to message everyone. She does so quickly and without any mistakes while going through the menus.

"What is it that you have planned, Master?" she asks.

"We are going to get Aeri and Regi back," I answer.

"What about the Snakes though?" she inquires.

"We'll think about that later, first we get our friends back before they get into more trouble."

"I'll do my best to gather everyone as soon as possible," she says.

With her quick statement she goes ahead of me and disappears into the floor's gate. This is it, the moment it all changes. I approach the gate and pull the teleport menu down, calmly I select Barrowdell. I get Aeri and Regi back today, I will get them back. I will restore this guild and I will lead it further. This is the resolve I needed, all these months I had been waiting for something and this is it.

"Hey Al…" Owl murmurs as I come out form the floor's gate.

"What?" I ask, almost fuming.

"I'm sorry you had to find out like that," he says sincerely.

I walk towards him ready to push him or something just to let out a bit of my anger but given how things went with Argo I hesitate. I'm not about to lose more friends, I must keep a cool head. Breathing in, I manage to restrain myself.

"You should've told me," I spit bitterly, "Why didn't you?"

"I was afraid of what you might do," he says, "I still am."

"We can't do anything about it," I say, "What's done is done and now we have something else to worry about."

"What would that be?" he asks.

"We are getting our guild back together, Aeri and Regi are coming back," I explain.

"I see, if that's what you want…I have your back."

He almost sounds reluctant, but I decide to ignore his tone and focus on avoiding the crowd on the streets. Getting to the guild house I set my hand on the door's knob and open it as Owl approaches me. I let him in first and right after I walk behind him. I close the door once we are in and see some of the members have already gathered. Ruri is being her usual self, hugging Kayla from the side as she tries real hard to press herself against her. I can't help but to chuckle; their relationship is something I'm yet to fully understand. Twyla is standing next Edelwiess, both of them looking quite serious, a rare sight but a most welcome one right now.

"Wh-what…uh is going on?" Siren asks, approaching me from the side.

"We have some things to discuss, but I want everyone to be here first."

She nods and brings her hands together with a somewhat uncomfortable cough. She plays with her fingers a little and then goes to the table to take a seat next to Hotoka. Hotoka looks at me and raises her hand in greeting and crosses her legs on top of the table. The door opens behind me and I turn in time to see Esra and Elina coming inside the house. I nod at Esra and she quickly retreats to join everyone.

"What's going on?" Elina asks.

"I'll explain in a second," I say and walk with her to join everyone at the table.

"What's with all the secrecy?" Hotoka asks, "It's making Siren uncomfortable."

"It's not…well kinda, a bit…" Siren stammers and then coughs loudly to clear her throat.

"I'm all for secrets and stuff but this feels a bit too weird," Ruri exclaims, still hanging from Kayla's neck.

"Whatever it is, must be important…" Kayla mutters.

Surprisingly Twyla has nothing to say on the matter, a first to be sure, and just leans over Edellwiess' snout. I walk slowly over the head of the table and place both of my hands there.

"Everyone calm down for a second please," I order, "Also take a seat; this might take a while."

They all nod in almost perfectly synchronization and take their seats. Only half the seats are filled, but I feel mighty important sitting at the head of the table. Esra refuses to sit down and stands behind my seat to my right.

"Esra and Owl had a run in with Aeri a few days ago," I say.

"What?!" Kayla huffs.

"Where is she?" Ruri asks.

Elina hangs her head a little and her expression becomes plagued with worry.

"Is she alright?" she asks.

"As of now, she is," I say, "Hotoka, Siren, you probably don't know much about Aeri but she was a former member of this guild."

"Yeah you mentioned, she went away along with…this Regi guy, after that issue with the White Snakes." Hotoka interrupts to clarify.

I nod and clear my throat.

"Owl and Esra have been… going out in secret, trying to track down and monitor the Snake's movements," I say and take a deep breath, "Maybe it's better if they explain."

I point my hand at Owl and then rest my elbows over the table. His stare lingers at me for a few seconds. He looks apologetic and very reluctant. He stands up.

"We've been conducting reconnaissance, over several places where the Snakes have been holing up in," he says, "Over the course of these…operations…we've found out a few things."

Awkwardly Owl stares in my direction, clearly asking Esra to help him out a little.

"May I speak, Master?" Esra asks.

It strikes a bit odd, after all she is been doing a whole lot of stuff without permission. I feel like punching myself seconds after. She shouldn't be asking me for permission to speak. I nod at her and smile a little.

"Of course, go ahead," I say.

"The White Snakes and their leader Klaus have been on the move constantly," she says, "They have taken small settlements in non-safe zones to conduct their nasty actions without interference."

"Settling in non-safe zones allows them to take hostages, which later they ransom for col. If their conditions are not met they tend to kill hostages after stripping them of every item and piece of col in their possession," Owl adds.

"That's a bit brutal…" Ruri mumbles.

"I think I've heard of these White Snakes," Siren comments firmly.

We all turn to her and she becomes self-conscious quite quickly. She looks down at her hands and starts tapping them on the table.

"I've heard of a few instances of them, PKing, stealing, stuff like that..." she mutters with fast speed, "guys that only wear white…"

"Sounds like them…" Elina grumbles.

"The thing is, they seem to be constantly moving around, probably to avoid The Army," Owl says.

"So in these secret missions of yours, what exactly have you guys been trying to track down?" Kayla interjects.

"Klaus," Esra says.

"The leader?" Hotoka asks.

"Yes, but that is no longer our focus," I interrupt.

"It isn't?" Esra asks, sounding both confused and surprised, "Oh…yes, sorry."

"I want to get Aeri and Reginald back, back into this guild."

"I thought they were red players," Hotoka says.

"And?" I snap.

"I, uh, well, was jus' sayin…" she mumbles in response.

"What are we going to do then?" Elina questions.

I stand up and lean over the table.

"I'm going to try and get Aeri back before she gets into more trouble," I explain, "And…we should all stop coming to this floor for a while, to be safe."

"What?! Why?" Ruri asks.

"Aeri has been killing a lot of White Snakes," I add.

The table grows silent; all of the sudden no one has any comments.

"I guess…that makes sense, it would be dangerous to keep her here with us…" Siren mumbles after a bit.

"Where would we go though?" Kayla asks.

Again the silence returns and even I find myself without an answer.

"I know a secret place," Siren says.

"Do tell," Ruri huffs.

"Well there's this secret inn on the twenty seventh floor," she silently proposes.

"A secret inn?" Owl asks.

"It's really well hidden…I got a unique item for being the first patron," she explains.

She stumbles through her menu, looking rather nervous and takes out a ticket. She passes it along and scratches her head in an odd moment of awkwardness. The ticket makes its way to me and I take it into my hand. It feels metallic, sort of high end for a simple ticket. It has Siren's name engraved in it and it reads "first patron".

"I think I have a discount if I go back, it's sort of expensive, but really nice and uh…well hidden," she says, her voices wavering a little.

"You sure it's hidden?" I ask.

She nods at me nervously but I know she means it. I ponder for a second and pace around feeling a bit unsure. She hasn't given me any reason to not trust her and knowing her she probably went there to be alone.

"Right, I want everyone to go there, but Esra will be coming with me," I state.

"But…" Elina mutters.

I place my hand in her shoulder and lean in a bit close to her.

"I'm not taking no for an answer," I say softly.

"I'll go with you too," says Owl, "Let me right my wrong. I should've told you before. Let me come with you."

Straightening, I look Owl in the eye. I try to smile a bit as I put both of my hands in his shoulders.

"I need you here, alright?" I say, "Get everyone to Siren's inn, keep them safe."

He doesn't look pleased but I hope he understands I really do need him here. Everyone around the table stands up and looks right at me.

"I don't want you just to go alone with Maid Extraordinaire there…but if you think it'll be alright I'll do as you say," Kayla says.

"Wish you would let me come with too, but you are the leader," Ruri seconds.

"I'll be sure to keep an eye on Owl," Hotoka says and sticks her tongue out.

I don't exactly have a plan; what I do have so far starts and stops in finding Aeri and Regi. Most likely I'll only find Aeri, but I'm sure she will lead me to Regi. I have to make us whole again. Owl just nods at me in acceptance and tells everyone to gather their stuff so they can head off to the secret inn. I stand idly, close to the table, in a weird kind of haze. Everyone passes by soon enough, saying that we'll see each other later, but I'm not too sure. This could go down in different ways. Elina is the last to go out the door but she stops.

"I'll see you tonight, right?" she asks, her back facing towards me.

"Of course you will," I say, lying through my teeth, feeling anxious as to how unsure I am.

She drops the bag she was carrying around in front of her and turns around quickly. She runs towards me and wraps her arms around my neck tightly, bringing me down a bit to kiss her. She kisses me desperately, but with passion and I hold her close not even caring that Esra is right behind me.

"I love you, you know that right?" she says.

"I love you too," I reply and kiss her once more.

She rests her forehead against mine and breathes in deeply. I know the following hours will be tough for her and they'll be tough on me too but I really have to do this. I gently grab her head with both of my hands and push us just a bit closer together.

"Stay safe, ok?" I say softly.

She chuckles slightly and pecks my lips gently.

"You stay safe, dummy," she says.

With that she slowly turns away from me and reluctantly leaves the guild house. With Esra behind me I finally feel the emptiness of the house sink in. A hear the distinct sound of a buckle tightening and turn around to see Esra in an attire I've never seen her before. A tight fitted leather armor and a weird white mask hanging from the side of her head.

"What are you wearing?" I ask.

"This…is my sneaking suit?" she says confused.

"Huh, what game is this? Metal Ge-" I interrupt myself, "…uh anyways. Are you sure that's enough armor?"

"Positive," she answers.

After a short, awkward pause, she speaks again. "Master, I've been meaning to ask…" Esra mumbles.

"Yeah?"

"How do you plan to make Aeri come back to us?"

"I don't know…I just hope we are not too late," I reply.

* * *

**Tenth Floor of Aincrad **

**Aeri**

"So this is it?" Aereth asks.

"Should be," I reply.

We lay low past some tall grass, overlooking the entrance to a rather big cave. Two Snakes stand guard the entrance to the cave. Klaus should be inside; I just might be able to kill him today. I crawl back a bit and then stand up. It's cloudy and thunder rumbles in the background; it might rain soon.

"I'm going to check around the area, make sure no one is behind us," Aereth says as he stands up.

I just nod and open my inventory to equip Cain and Able. Both gauntlets appear over my arms and I open and close my fingers to see if they are secure. I raise my right hand near my face and ready up a skill. My now pointy fingertips shine brightly and with a smile I release the skill. Out of sheer habit I trace my right index finger over my neck. The burning feeling of the scars I just seem to notice less and less every time I put these on.

"Aeri?" a voice behind me mutters.

Surprised I turn around, making my "claws" shine brightly with a skill. I catch a glimpse of Aereth brutally tackling another figure.

"This guy slipped past me," he huffs.

I walk over to them and grab the man's hair pulling his head up a bit.

"Whoever he is, he kno-…Al?"

I push Aereth off of him and help him on his feet. Once he is on his feet I back away, feeling scared for reasons I can't explain.

"I can't believe I found you," he says.

I remain silent, staring at his face, it's been so long. Unknowingly I raise my hands up to his face and hold it gently in place. There's this whole different air to him now. Has it really been that long? I then get close to him and hug him tightly. He spreads his arms apart in surprise but then hugs me back.

"I…I…"

"I missed you," he says softly.

"I missed you too…" I whisper.

"Aereth, please get off my other boyfriend," Aereth grumbles in a mocking tone as he gets up.

I push Al away in a heartbeat, then turn and push Aereth into the ground again.

"Other boyfriend?" Al asks.

"I can explain…" I mutter.

"Have fun with that," Aereth huffs.

"Shut up, asshole!" I growl.

"Who the hell is this guy?" Al asks.

"Aereth asshole, she just said so," Aereth snaps back.

"Watch your tone, dumbass," Al replies.

"Master, I finally found you!" says a woman coming out of the woods.

She wears an outfit I saw a few days ago, when I saw Owl.

"Esra?" I question.

"Aeri, we found you," she says.

"Oh, you wanna go?" Aereth yells.

"Shut up!" I scoff and push Al and Aereth away from each other.

A weird feeling of anxiety brews up in me for a second but I quickly shake my head trying to get rid of it. Esra comes closer to Al and removes that dumb fox mask off her face.

"Who is this man?" Esra asks.

"Aereth asshole…" Al says in a mocking tone.

Aereth just crosses his arms and comes closer behind me.

"You are here to kill Klaus, aren't you?" Al asks.

"Yes…" I answer softly.

"I see…Aeri, maybe-" He starts, but I cut him off.

"No Al, don't…I'm not just gonna leave now, I'm so close."

"I don't think we can persuade you…can we?" Esra asks.

I shake my head slowly.

"I've also tried…but here we are." Aereth mumbles.

"Please don't try to tear me away from this…I…I need this," I mutter.

I can feel their penetrating stares over me, but I don't need their approval, I just need them to stay the fuck out of my way. I could do this on my own, but things are just getting more convoluted by the second.

"Fine…" Al says with a heavy sigh, "What are we going to do?"

"I don't have a plan for the four of us, however…I think we can still do what I had in mind," I say, "Aereth, you'll be guarding them."

"Huh, what for?" he asks.

"They are not going to become red players," I state firmly.

"We'll fight if we have to!" Al says.

"No you won't, I won't let you turn that cursor orange," I reply.

"Master, I think we should listen to her," Esra says.

"Aeri, I want you and Regi to come back to the guild," Al says.

Esra nods along with him and Aereth shifts in his place, looking a bit uncomfortable. The thought had crossed my mind several times, I've talked about it with Regi but we always come down to the same answer. We refuse to go back because of what it would mean for the guild, red players would taint the reputation Al has been trying so hard to uphold.

"Al I don't think we can…we have two new people with us, even if we accept…I won't leave them behind."

"Huh…thanks," Aereth mutters quietly, sounding a bit surprised.

"We'll take them in," Al insists.

"But what about what the guild is all about? What about other players?" I question.

"We've decided to go into a…hiatus," Esra comments, "Aeri, please just consider it."

"I mean having a place…on top of that where people don't exactly hate you would be nice," Aereth says.

I bite my lower lip, lost in thought. Did Al really track me down just to take me in again? Why did he wait until now to do so? A part of me wants to say yes and go see everyone else right now. But the desire to kill Klaus is stronger, stronger than it has ever been before.

"Will you let me go back once I'm done here?" I ask, avoiding my former leader's gaze.

"Of course Aeri, you are my friend…I just wish you could let this go, maybe we could stay out of trouble, just this once," he begs.

"No, you know I can't do that," I say and get closer to him, "I'm…glad you can see past this, I really am, but the only chance I got at going back is to kill Klaus. Don't try to take it away from me, please."

Once close to him I'm able to see an expression in his eyes I've never seen directed to me before. That of pity, worry and sadness all in one annoying little bundle. I suppress the urge to snap back at his expression putting a stop to myself. I can't lose it, not when I'm this close.

"Fine…" Al agrees reluctantly.

"What will you have us do?" Esra asks.

"You'll stay behind Aereth at all times, I'll do the…killing." I explain, "We should be in and out in just a few minutes."

I walk over to the tall grass in which we were spying upon the caves entrance and see that the guards doubled up. This whole time we spent discussing probably allowed more Snakes to regroup here. Dammit.

"Aereth, they doubled up outside," I say.

"Crap. Can you candle the four of them alone?"

I raise my hands and clench my fists, that odd smile crawls over my face once again.

"Of course I can, you'll just have to be more careful in case one slips by," I answer confidently.

He nods and stands up, going back to Al and Esra. Actually four people in an open are like this could give me trouble. Any of them could go inside the cave and alert of our approach. I look back and see Aereth and Al discussing how to go about their formation. I glance back at the entrance and see that all four guards seem to be wasting time, they aren't exactly paying attention. It's now or never.

I go past the tall blades of grass and slide down the muddy mountainside, down to the entrance of the cave. I run as fast as I can and approach the first two guards. They aren't the primary concern right now. I need to take out the two closest to the entrance. I ready up my right hand and dig my fingers into the first guy coming my way. He grunts as my fingers dig into his chest but I keep rushing, pushing him backwards as I make my way forwards. As I get closer to the other two guards I let go of him and jump in the air with another skill ready. I fall down right on top another Snake. I claw at his face with my shining finger tips after five quick swipes I bring my hand up and feel it vibrate intensely. Once the whirring sound reaching a high enough pitch I let go and my hand goes through the poor bastard's skull, killing him in the process. As I was killing him his friend comes to the conclusion that it's probably a good time to attack me so he swings his sword over my head. I simply lift my left hand up and stop his weapon mere inches away from my face.

"What the…" he huffs.

I swipe him off his feet with my leg and grab his sword as he let's go of it. Wanting to show off a bit I swing it in my hand to adjust my grip on it and drive it through his stomach to pin him to the ground. From my thigh I take out a paralyzing knife and throw it at his leg. Once dealt with him I turn around to see the other two guys rushing towards me, the one I attacked first lagging behind the other.

"Aeri!" Al and Aereth yell in unison as they slide down the mountain side.

This makes both Snakes turn around and I take my chance. I dash forwards and grab the armed hand of the player. I twist it back making him drop his sword and then slash at him from his face all the way down to his waist. Then I push him away and charge up another skill. I close my fist and once I let go the game pushes me forward with great speed, making my fist go right though the guy's abdomen. He shatters in an instant.

"One to go," I say with a smile.

Turning around reveals Aereth, Al and Esra making the last Snake surrender. Irked by this sight, I stomp my feet on the ground like a child as I make my way to them.

"Stand aside," I snap.

"What? He surrendered, it's o-" Al says but I push him away.

"Please don't kill me!" the white garbed man begs.

I lift him up from his neck with my left hand and just slightly mange to get his feet of the ground. He is choking on his own words as he cries for me not to kill him.

"Aeri…"Aereth huffs, "Come on…"

I can hear Esra telling me to calm down but as she does I drive my hand inside the poor guy. Slowly I drag it up and then down, destroying his health points. He heaves and tries to scream as I choke him but as I'm halfway through dragging my hand up again he disappears from my grasp, leaving only tiny crystals behind.

"Now let's keep going," I huff and turn around to head to the cave, not even bothering to look behind.

"You could've spared him," Aereth says.

"No, he had to die; they will all die," I reply managing a tone unlike my normal voice.

Not even caring anymore if they are following, I enter the cave. Once inside, I slow down, quickly becoming weary of my surroundings. It's silent, it's not like I expected to hear anything from the entrance but something should bounce off these walls, yet I don't hear a thing.

"This feels sketchy as hell," Al mutters.

"Yes, I don't like how this looks," Aereth says.

"Calm down for a sec," I insist.

I take another step forward into a pressure plate. My right foot sinks slowly into the ground and a weird gas quickly envelops us.

"God dammit…it's paral—" Aereth says, his voice slowly turning into incoherent grunts.

I try to open my mouth but can't even manage that simple task. I'm stuck with grunting and barely breathing. This gas is way too strong, my body slowly meets the ground and in an effort to move I manage to fall on my back. I can't talk, I can't move, what the hell is this?

"Well, well, I have to admit, I expected more of the girl that has relentlessly been hunting me down," a voice says.

That voice, I know that voice, it's his fucking voice. As I lay on the floor I try to move as much as I can but I can't even manage to close my fist. His steps become louder and in a few seconds I finally see him leaning over me. The leader of the White Snakes.

"Good job though, you made it this far," he says with a grin.

I start growling and grunting like a mad animal. I want to get up I want to rip his throat out, I want to watch him die right now. The result is my body shaking slightly on the ground as weird snippets of my breathing and grunting escape in-between my teeth.

"Are you that happy to see me?" he mocks, "I have a surprise for you in the next room, I think you'll love it."

He grabs my hair and starts dragging me into the next room. Once he pulls my head off the ground I can see the others being dragged behind me by other Snakes. I close my eyes tightly as the hair pulling becomes a little painful but it only fuels my rage. He manages to get us all into the next room where he lifts me from my hair and makes me kneel on the floor against my will. My movement remains less than minimal, only just now I managed to close my fist. Not satisfied with my already impaired body, Klaus ties my hands behind my back and stabs me with a knife with even more paralyzer. In the corner of my eye I see how three other people dressed in white line up Aereth, Al and Esra to my left. They also quickly bind their hands behind them and apply more paralyzer. One of the white garbed men snatches Esra's mask off her face and punches her across the face.

"Well now it's a party," Klaus says, "I had planned to get everyone in your shitty little guild here, but as of noon they are nowhere to be found."

I hear Al chuckle slightly, despite the paralyzer. It makes me grin a bit; even after all this time he's still got it in him. Klaus kicks Al in the face and then sighs deeply. I try to stand up but still I can't move at all, my legs merely shift beneath me.

"But I guess I'll have to be satisfied with you," he says and laughs, "And them."

He points to the other side of the room and I see Regi, Sinna, and Owl. Sinna is gagged and blindfolded completely tied from head to toe as she struggles to move, unlike Regi and Owl who are most likely also paralyzed. Regi is also blindfolded but he seems to be bound just like we are. Owl is tied harshly with multiple bindings and he still has that white mask covering his face. Klaus walks over to Regi and rips the piece of cloth blinding him. Regi stares at Klaus with angry eyes.

"Let's make some things clear, ok?" Klaus says, "I'm not here to kill you, well at least not all of you. I have to say though our little masked friend here is an added bonus as we just captured him minutes ago. It would seem he was sneaking about a place he shouldn't."

A diabolical grin spreads across his face and he brings with hands together. He is taking far too many notes from movie villains.

"Besides, we have some guests," he says and with his arm elegantly presents two figures all dressed in black.

No way.

"It is truly a shame you didn't further consider my offer, young lady," PoH says as he comes out of the shadows, "Otherwise, you wouldn't be in this situation."

"Although, your friends would probably still be here," XaXa adds.

"That is true, however, due to recent negotiations, Klaus has agreed to a deal."

A deal? I try to move my mouth to speak but this paralyzer is still far too strong for me to do anything about it. To my left I can see the others, struggling under the poison as much as I am. I can feel and hear my right hand whirring as I fight the feeling. I need to get up…I need to kill.

"We'll let you and your friends go," Klaus states, "but this freedom will come with a price."

PoH walks over to Regi and stands him up on his feet. With a small knife he cuts his bindings and pokes him with this knife. Regi slowly begins moving and is about to turn around, ready to attack PoH. A massive cleaver appears in PoH's hand and with a swift, single movement he places it against Regi's throat.

"Come on now, don't do anything stupid," PoH says, that husky tone of his voice drenching his words.

Regi stops his fist and takes a few steps back, he now stands in between Sinna, Owl, and us. Something feels wrong, something feels very wrong. XaXa takes out a short sword and throws it at Regi's feet. Klaus silently makes his way behind Owl and kicks him forward. He limply falls over on his face and then Klaus drags him in front of Regi by his hair. XaXa helps Klaus prop Owl up again on his knees.

"If you want you and your friends to go free, you only have to kill this man," PoH states.

Esra's yelps, her voice barely escaping her mouth. She shakes and struggles wildly, but is soon sedated once again by a White Snake standing behind her.

"I don't know this man, I have no reason to kill him," Regi says.

"You have a reason, and we have given it to you," XaXa replies.

"Kill him and you and your friends are free to go, refuse to do so and we'll kill you all," PoH adds.

"His health is already quite low, one hit should do," Klaus says.

"A life in exchange of six?" Regi asks, rhetorically, "How do I know you'll let us go?"

"You will have to take my word for it," PoH says.

Regi's gaze deviates to myself, his stare lingers on me. I try to shake my head, he doesn't know that man is Owl.

"Re…gii, you can't…" Al mumbles, sounding odd as he speaks through his teeth.

"I…I gotta try Al, if it means we get to go…I'll do it," Regi replies.

The man behind Al kicks him into the ground and once again applies more paralyzer. Someone needs to stop him, someone needs to do something. My body refuses to cooperate, the status ailment icon still residing below my health bar.

Regi bends down to pick up the sword and slowly approaches Owl. The sword begins shinning and the whirring sound slowly becomes louder. He stands a foot away from the man and a little hesitantly Regi raises the sword. His arm starts swinging towards Owl and as soon as the sword is about to make contact Owl stands up. Sadly it's not enough to avoid Regi's attack and Owl leans forward into Regi.

"This…isn't your fault," Owl says softly, but loudly enough for us to hear.

Regi's eyes become wide with shock as Owls body bursts over him. Esra falls over in her stomach and a soft cry is heard coming from her.

"Owl…no…" she whimpers as any will to fight escapes her.

"Wait… he was with you…? He...no..." Regi muttered looking confused. Then his gaze settled on PoH.

He looks down at his hand and I can see his hold over the sword tremble. He shakes his head, still trying to make sense of what just happened.

"You bastards! You knew!" Regi bellows and turns his sword on PoH.

Regi readies a skill and takes a few steps towards PoH. He swings at the blackhooded man with intent to kill him. PoH with an elegant swing slices Regi's sword in half. I lose focus on the battle after that. Sinna is kneeling on the floor, her blindfold slipped from her eyes and she seems to be disoriented. Her eyes quickly lock with mine before diverting to the fight taking place in front of her. PoH kicks Regi away, setting him back in the middle of the room. With a quick few steps he gets close to Regi and then with his cleaver shining bright red swings at his neck. With a quick and simple swing he manages to detach Regi's head from his body. His body shatters abnormally fast and PoH calmly returns his arms to his sides. Silence lingers in the room for a few seconds.

"If only he hadn't done that, you guys would be on your merry way," XaXa comments.

A void makes itself present in my stomach, I can feel my lips trembling. My left eye is twitching and my hands shake wildly behind my back. The men behind us join PoH on the other side of the cave with a few prompts in their menus they simultaneously change their white cloaks to black ones.

"As of today the White Snakes are no longer," PoH says, "They will be of use in our future endeavors."

Klaus steps forwards. his white clothes also now replaced with black attire. He bends a knee and grabs my chin, forcing me to stare at him.

"You reduced my guild to six people and myself, you crazy bitch," he says, "I only regret that they won't allow me to kill you."

"Leave the girl alone," XaXa says, "Her time might come, but today is not it."

PoH raises his hand and the former snakes raise blue crystals in the air. They all shout different locations in Aincrad and vanish in a flash of light. XaXa does the same without uttering another word to either Klaus or Poh, leaving us all only with them. I feel my lips finally parting as I regain more control of my body.

"I will kill you all…" I mutter, "I will hunt you all down, and I will kill you! All of you!"

"I expect nothing less, young lady," PoH says.

Tears run down my face but I can barely feel their lukewarm presence. Klaus turns his head to me and gives me a smirk.

"We will regroup in the accorded location," PoH states.

"Yeah, I'll see you there," Klaus says and takes out a crystal himself.

PoH does so as well and chanting the name of a settlement in the fourth floor he disappears from the room. Klaus puts away his crystal and walks over to me again. He is disobeying PoH and XaXa. I can't help but to smile. My hands can now easily slip through my bindings but I hide that fact by still keeping my hands behind my back. He crouches in-front of me and gives me a shit eating grin.

"That paralyzer should wear off soon so I might only have a few seconds to kill you," he says.

"Here I thought your new owner forbid you of that," I tease.

I fairly certain I can move my whole body now but I decide to keep that a secret. Behind him I can hear Sinna sobbing, her body is on the floor, her eyes closed tight as her muffled cries barely manage to go through her covered mouth. Al laughs kind of loudly, I turn to him and see him staring at my hands.

"What's so funny, you idiot?" Klaus asks enraged and walk over to him.

In a fit of rage Klaus hits Al across the face and then kicks him for good measure. I stand up, my legs feel a bit wobbly but I quickly regain all of my movement. I bring my hands in-front of me and silently walk to Klaus. Al sees me from the ground and he just starts laughing louder. Klaus seems too preoccupied hitting him that he doesn't notice I'm right behind him. He raises his fist to strike Al once again and I grab it from behind.

"What?" he scoffs.

I clamp my right hand down on his head and thanks to a skill I swing him over myself and throw him across the room. With my index finger I cut Al's bindings and then do the same for Aereth.

"Get Sinna out of here," I say.

"I'm not letting you fight that guy alone," Aereth replies.

I walk past him and then turn my head to look at him.

"Don't make me say that again," I say.

I can see him gulp and quickly gets on his feet and makes his way to Sinna. Al stands up and brandishes a fairly long and fancy looking sword. He approaches me and stands at my side ready to attack Klaus.

"Al, put that down," I plead.

"No way, I'm helping you wi-"

I place my index finger over his mouth and with my other hand I point his sword down.

"You need to keep your cursor green," I say with a small smile, "Don't worry, I'll be sure to kill him."

He stares at me, with a confused expression, as if he had seen a stranger. I cannot blame him, I don't even know myself anymore. Klaus is still struggling to get off the ground as I close my distance on him. I stand over him and in a desperate attempt to hurt me he stabs his sword right through me. With a chuckle I catch the blade with both of my hands and break the damn thing in half. I pull out the half of the blade stuck in me and discard it. I sit down on Klaus' stomach and without breaking my gaze, start attacking his face. I claw at him and savagely pull my hand back. He starts screaming but soon I block his cries and can only hear my iron clad fingers digging into him and then harshly drawing back and away. After a few seconds of clawing at his ugly face I close my fists and start smashing them against his face, I start doing so with a skill and continue to draw from his health as I beat him.

"Die! Die! Die! Die!" I yell as I continue the relentless attack.

I spread my fingers apart and dig both of my hands into his face until they meet. From the very center of his head as I start dragging my hands forward. Desperately he takes that crystal out of his pockets and raises it into the air. His desperate shout is barely recognizable.

"Teleport Starting City!"

His body disappears quickly and I'm left unfulfilled. I dig my fingers into the ground and drag them away slowly.

"No!" I bellow, "Dammit, no!"

In a fit of rage I start clawing madly at the ground and after I just punch it intensely. I'm heaving, gasping for air with every breath I take. For some reason the only thing I can focus is on the scars in my body, they burn intensely but slowly I block off the feeling. That void in my core becomes bigger for some reason, it becomes stronger. I stand up slowly and breathe in deeply, I feel odd, and something doesn't feel right at all.

I turn around and see Al, he looks worried and nervous, but still he approaches me. He drops his sword and hugs me tightly. I don't wrap my arms around, my arms stay limp, hanging from my sides. I merely rest my head over his shoulder and gasp surprised at a shadowy picture that approaches us from behind. A distorted figure of a woman walks closer to us but I can't seem to coherently produce any words to alert Al of her presence.

"You know…I really do think you deserve some commendation," she says.

I get a clearer look and see her long, flowing black hair goes past her shoulders. Her whole body is shrouded in dark, blurry clothes, they remind me of the ones I wore at the beginning. What is happening? I feel the need to scream once I see her face. I'm scared frozen and can hear Al speaking next to my ear but it barely sounds like a whisper. He is calling my name trying to get my attention. The woman grins widely and brushes a bit of her past her ear. She presses her index finger against the side of her head and pushes, titling her own head to the side. This woman wears my face. Shell-shocked, I hold myself completely still as she whispers into my ear.

"I'm really surprised it took you this long to snap."

* * *

Crysina here!

This chapter was beta-read by DragonofAnnoth!

Please don't be so mad at me guys, things need to happen for stories to move forward and to keep themselves interesting. This is my longest chapter to date and my first to feature a little extra bonus past this AN. Aeri has finally snapped and Al has managed to complete his objective sadly with a few losses in the process. Hold on to your pants cause we are about to take a wild turn.

First off of my chest **Silvariux**, **Devilparrot**, I had planned these deaths before I knew your favorite characters, the moment you mentioned them I felt super bad about this chapter coming in the future. I'M SORRY! Instead of addressing every review today (because there isn't much to address anyways) I just want to point out how almost anyone so far that has reviewed my story writes these long, really thought out reviews and I love that. Reading how the chapters made you feel, what it made you think and the speculation some of you make just makes me feel amazing and super accomplished as a writer. (This is a long freaking stretch considering I'm just a dumb fanfiction writer a.k.a. A person with too much time that has nothing better to do than write a story based of content that I don't even own.) But it still fills my withered heart with joy and happiness. I've uploaded a new sketch to reflect on simpler times along with a nice update to chapters on my profile page, please check them out. Either way without any further interruptions I'll let you check out the bonus chapter section premiering this week (*cue fireworks and confetti*). Remember these are just extra tidbits of story and ultimately don't add all that much to the story. So they are completely skippable if you so desire to ignore them.

As always please review if you like what you read (still hoping for new reviewers ; _ ;) or just want to say anything about the story or my awful writing. I'll see you all next week.

Next Chapter: "In Water"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 1.- Worries**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Thickwoods**

**Hotoka**

Oh man I screwed up, I screwed up hard. Where did he go? He just completely disappeared. Dammit Owl, where did you go? I nervously scan around the mess of trees Siren has lead us to and my worries start getting the best of me as I start scratching my head anxiously.

"Something wrong?" Siren asks.

"Hah! What?! No!" I reply.

"Owl is no longer following us," Ruri says.

"I'm sorry! I don't know where he went, I thought he was following me!" I confess.

"He is probably just checking it's clear behind us, don't worry," Kayla says.

"Yeah that's probably it, right?" I say.

"Yeah Owl is always taking care of us, don't worry about it too much," Eli reassures.

A loud rustling from the side gets louder before I can see Edelwiess jump from my right side. It stomps hard and slows down for Twyla to get off of him. She skips happily for a few feet before turning to me with a big smile on her face.

"How are we doing ladies?" she asks.

"Heh, come to think of it it's only us right now, huh?" Siren mutters.

"Yeah, you can immediately tell because you stop stuttering when talking," Ruri teases.

"Come on, that's mean," Eli butts in.

A laugh a little, after all it's true, Siren has never felt comfortable around Al or Owl and she tends to get nervous when they are around.

"You can also tell because you stop looking for excuses to ogle at Owl," Siren replies with a smug grin.

When she is with us she tends to be more…proactive.

"Is that so?" Kayla mutters sounding a bit upset.

"I can explain," Ruri says quickly and without thinking, "I mean, what? I don't do that!"

Our banter turns into laughs and the sounds of Kayla pinching Ruri's cheeks. But I can't seem to shake off a feeling of uncertainty. It's odd and I can no longer seem to place it. Elina approaches me from and like the great mood radar that she is begins to stare at me.

"Is it that easy to tell?" I ask.

"You are putting on a pretty weird frown," she laughs.

"I don't know…I feel like I should be keeping an eye on him, he didn't look like...uh, himself," I try to explain, "I mean you have known him longer than me but…I don't know…"

"He did seem odd, but I'm sure he is just checking we are safe, don't worry," she says.

"Yeah maybe I'm just exaggerating," I admit.

"Yeah, you should calm down a bit, hehe," she says, "Worrying is my job."

Her words put me at ease, she is good at that. I haven't known her for that long either but she is probably the sweetest, most caring person I've met in this game. I'm really grateful to have met them, if it weren't for them I would still be hanging around with the wrong people. On top of that I would still be sucking real hard at this game.

"So, where is this inn, Siren?" I ask.

"Just a few more minutes, oh my god I can't wait to show it to you guys, it has some sweet hot springs," she answers.

"Hey, hey, aren't you gonna get a little kick from that?" Twyla asks while pointing at Ruri.

Edelwiess growls as if backing up Twyla's question and it proceeds to swish its tail violently. Siren blushes a bit and then coughs to clear her throat.

"Haha, yes," Ruri states, "I mean, no, what? You guys need to shut up!"

"Yeah, you don't seem to think before you speak," Kayla huffs, her eyebrow twitching and her hands closing into a fist.

The group falls into laughter yet again and I stop walking alongside everybody. I take a moment to appreciate the scenery, it's not exactly beautiful but it has its own sense awe. My worries come back for a second and make the dark thick forest around me take a whole different color in my eyes. I feel sudden dread and a goose bump slithers its way down my spine.

"Hotoka, you coming?" Twyla asks.

"Yeah, yeah," I huff, "Wait for me."


	44. Chapter 44 - In Water

**Chapter 44.- In Water**

**November/1st/2023**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Thickwoods**

**Alshep**

"Hey…I…I can carry Sinna, if you want," Aeri stammers.

"It's alright, I don't mind it so much," Aereth replies.

A simple exchange of words, yet something is masked behind them. Aereth saw the same person I saw, one totally unlike the Aeri I knew. I know she has been killing Snakes, but what she did today was not a righteous killing. It was murder. It was a _massacre_. If it were me I wouldn't keep the child from her, she seems quite attached to her, but maybe Aereth has better judgment than I will ever have. All this time we've spent walking, Aeri has been keeping an uncharacteristic distance away, occasionally mumbling stuff to herself. We all have a breaking point, and instinctively now Aeri has reached hers. That display of pure rage back in the cave certainly helped plant the idea. Yet, I think it's good she did what she did, otherwise she would be more bottled up than she is right now.

"Master…" Esra mutters.

"What is it, Esra?"

"Siren will come out to meet us soon…to show us the way…" she mumbles.

"Are you ok?"

"No…I don't think so, master," she replies slowly.

She walks close to me, almost as if protecting me. She holds in her hands Owl's mask, slowly tracing her fingers over it. By no means do I think she was in some sort of romantic relationship with Owl, but given what they have been doing it would be dumb to assume they didn't become quite close.

"Esra…I'm sorry, it was probably my fault…" I apologize.

"What do you mean?"

"I asked him not to come…he probably followed us because I didn't give him the chance to come," I explain, "Maybe if I let him come along, things woul-"

"It's not your fault," she says firmly, "I would've done the same…I would've disobeyed your orders and followed you two into that mess. Maybe if you had chosen him…I would be the one dead and maybe then you would be faring better."

"Don't say that," I say angrily.

I grab her shoulders and pull her close.

"Don't ever say that again…" I beg, "Your life is equally as valuable as his was…as Regi's!"

"But maybe if I hadn't come along, he would still be alive!" she cries.

Tears run frantically down her face and her nose betrays her as her breathing becomes purely nasal. Aereth and Aeri stop a few feet ahead probably to take a break, probably to stare at us.

"Even so! Do you really think it would be ok if you died in their place?!" I ask, "He's gone…and so is Regi. And there's nothing we can do about it. 'What if's are stupid…we cannot undo what has been done."

She keeps crying, she lifts her arms to wipe away her tears but they don't seem to stop. She sobs and breathes heavily with no real sign of stopping.

"Trust me if I could…I would exchange my own life if it mean getting everyone back…" I say, "If my death meant bringing back Kato, Daath, Owl and Regi…I would gladly die! But I can't do that…I need to care of this guild."

Her expression just becomes more and more pained as I say these words. I'm not lying…I would die if it meant bringing back anyone. But I can't do that, so what I can do I need to focus on. I need to take care of what's left us.

"I need to take care of everyone…" I say, "So please…don't ever say that again. I don't want another friend to leave me."

Her crying just becomes louder but she pushes her head into my chest. Her hands clutch tightly at my shoulders and she cries as loud as she can. It takes a few minutes but soon her crying comes to a rather abrupt end. She wipes her nose and her eyes as she stops leaning on me.

"I'm…I'm sorry," she says, as she regains control of herself, "I won't leave this guild prematurely, Master."

"I'm glad to hear so," I reply.

"Hey…" Siren says as she jumps down from a tree.

"How long have you been there?" I ask.

"I…uh…didn't want to interrupt…" Siren excuses herself, "Either way…please follow me."

As awkward as ever. We start following through the trees, with a more usual composure Esra keeps to my side. She thoroughly scans the dark forest, nighttime in woods like these can make it almost pitch black.

Siren approaches me quickly and covering the side of her mouth she leans in a bit to whisper a question.

"Is it true…? Is Owl really…gone?" she asks.

I remain silent and look down at the ground. It's as simple as checking his contact on her menu or checking the guild member's list. I don't want to reiterate what's obvious so I keep quiet and nod at Siren. There isn't much I want to say about it.

"I…see," she says, looking gloomy.

I guess I'm easy to read, it's not like I make it difficult anyways. She proceeds to move to the front to lead the way. I hang back a bit; I want to try and talk with Aeri a little.

"Hey, I'll be right back, ok?" I say to Esra, "Try to ease up a bit."

She nods and keeps her current pace as I slow down to get closer to Aeri. I get close to her side quick enough.

"Hey…something wrong?" she asks.

Her face is covered in scars, and it's been something I've been meaning to ask about, but I think this is hardly the moment. Still, it's rather distracting…

"Please stop staring…" she pleads.

"Shit…sorry, it's just that uh…your face…" I mutter.

I am truly the master of tact.

"Oh…right, it's nothing really," she says and with her menu enquips those weird gauntlets of hers.

Once they are off her body the scars on her face disappear leaving no trace of them behind. I raise an eyebrow at the sudden change.

"I see…" I huff, "You doing alright?"

"Well I could be doing better, right?" she says with a forced chuckle.

With her right arm she takes hold of her left elbow and breathes out deeply.

"We couldn't do anything to save them…again," she says, hopelessness permeating her voice, "I wanted to scream that it was Owl…"

"That damn poison was too strong…" I mumble, "It's not your fault, Aeri…"

She looks at me with a frown but ultimately accepts what I say.

"I just wish I could've done something…" she sighs.

"Me too," I say, "We'll lay low for a while… a lot of people in the guild really want to see you."

My attempt to change the subject might be too sudden but we need to stop thinking about this as soon as possible. She chuckles slightly and smiles at me.

"I've really missed Eli a lot," she says.

"Heh, she's missed you too, even Kayla," I add, "And you won't believe who she is dating. Ha ha!"

"What? Kayla has a boyfriend now?" she asks.

"Girlfriend," I correct.

"No way," she says surprised, "Who?"

"You'll have to see by yourself," I tease.

We laugh for a brief moment but it feels somewhat forced. We stop speaking and continue to walk silently for a while. I cough, trying to clear the air but sadly I'm fresh out of words to exchange with Aeri. She chuckles a bit again.

"I heard from Argo you got some new members," she asks.

Argo…suddenly I feel like sending a message to the whiskered girl, but she blocked me in the early afternoon.

"Uh, yeah," I utter, "Siren and Hotoka."

"Huh, more girls?" she asks.

"Yeah, heh. You know…I actually never thought about that. I'm outnumbered," I joke.

She clears her throat and looks away. Bad joke, I guess.

"You...you seem different," she says.

"What do you mean?"

"I, uh, well, you know," she coughs, "You got this whole new air about you."

"Heh, I don't think I've changed that much," I mutter and turn my head to her.

She is staring at me intensely, I find myself oddly drawn to her gaze. Without warning she breaks it off by shaking her head. I scratch the back of my head out of sheer awkwardness.

"You…kind of remind me of him now," she mumbles.

"Who?"

"Daath…" she murmurs, "Uhm…forget I said anything, sorry."

She takes a few steps away from me and proceeds to stare away into the forest. Feeling kind of dazed I slowly begin to drift back over to Esra.

"It's not that far ahead," Siren says, "It'll be perfect for you all…"

"I hope so…" Aereth grumbles.

"It has hot springs and the whole deal. Nice food, nice futons…even the NPC running the place feels super smart and stuff…uh you'll like it."

"It does sound nice, I could use a bath," Esra mutters.

I nod silently as we approach a rundown building. The door is hanging from its hinges, windows are boarded up, it looks pretty much destroyed. This can't possibly be it.

"So much for getting my hopes up," Aereth scoffs as he steps up the destroyed entrance.

"H-hey! Don't be so quick to judge," Siren says as she pushes the door open.

Bright light floods the entrance as the cleverly hidden lamplight spills into the forest. The inside of the building is floored up with shiny, smooth wood. We walk in, obviously awestruck. Just by going inside you feel relaxed. It smells nice, like if some incense were burning, completely soothing.

"Oh Siren, it is lovely to see you again dear," an Elf lady sings with joy, "Oh my, you brought more friends, wonderful!"

"This is Sylvianna," Siren says, "She runs the inn."

"I thought you said this place was run by an NPC," Aeri comments.

"It is, she is just…highly intelligent," Siren explains.

"Will your friends be staying like the rest?" Sylvianna asks.

"Yeah, we are all together," Siren replies.

"Lovely, just lovely, it's been centuries since we've had this many people," the Elf exclaims happily.

"Centuries?" I ask under my breath.

"She has this deep backstory to her," Siren mutters back.

I nod at her and see how the happy elf runs around the lobby area fetching a lot of things from different places. She comes back with a small stack of clothes and kneels on the floor. She sets the clothes in-front of her and starts beckoning everyone over.

"Please, I have a strict policy of keeping this place neat and tidy," she says, "So please wear these while in the inn."

Siren goes through her menu and changes her clothing to a plain blue yukata. She walks past Sylvianna and waves us goodbye as she disappears further into the fancy looking insides of the inn. Sylvianna gives a yukata to Aeri and smiles. She does the same with Esra and then comes Aereth, who stands in front of me still carrying the little girl.

"I'll go on ahead, master," Esra says.

"Yeah, please don't mind me," I reply.

"Oh goodness, a child! She is very cute," Sylvianna says, "Please allow me to hold her so you can get dressed."

"It's really ok, you don-"

The blonde elf snatches the girl away from Aereth's arms and holds her with one hand and with her other hands a yukata to Aereth.

"Child, wake up," she says in a melodic sweet voice.

The girl slowly opens her eyes and frantically looks around, trying to figure out where she is. The elf starts patting her back gently and turns her body so the girl can see Aereth.

"Calm down child, you are safe," she says and see the girl up on her two feet, "Would you like to wear this? It is quite comfortable."

"Where am I? Where's Aeri?" she asks, her voice sulking once again.

"I'm here sweetie," Aeri replies quickly and stands in front of Aereth.

The girl jumps to Aeri's arms and hugs her tightly. Aeri embraces her with the same fondness.

"You have to put this on though, ok?" Aeri explains.

The girl nods and quickly equips her own yukata. Aeri starts walking further into the inn while holding the girl along with Aereth. She stops halfway through the hallway and turns to me with an apologetic face. Aereth catches up to her and doesn't hesitate to go a bit past her.

"Sorry, we'll go on ahead," she says.

"It's ok," I say with a grin.

She turns around and I sigh deeply.

"Is something amiss, sir?" Sylvianna asks while staring at me with her big emerald green eyes.

This AI is a tad bit intrusive for my taste, but at the same time, she doesn't feel like an NPC. I do a double take on the space over her head and see no colored cursor of any kind.

"It's nothing really…" I huff.

She is about to give me my robe when she backs away for a second.

"One does not wear a face like that if nothing troubles him," she says.

"It's just been a bad day, and we lost a few friends…" I answer.

She immediately hands me my robe and bows strongly at me.

"Apologies, I did not mean to intrude," she says, "Enjoy your stay, and if you need anything please don't hesitate to call me."

"Hey, no it's nothing to…" I stop myself, "…thank you."

She lifts her head up and smiles brightly at me before also disappearing into the inn. I put the yukata into my inventory and equip it shortly after. It's soft and it fits alright. I tug a little on the top to take a peek inside since it feels quite breezy. Nothing under it.

"Well I guess it comes close to how you wear them in a ryokan…" I mutter to myself.

I start walking down the corridor and reach the end of it. It makes a sharp left and as soon as I turn I see Sylvianna. A bit surprised I almost jump but manage to not make it look like she surprised me.

"Hello again," she says, "down this corridor you'll reach the common area, there's a variety of games, food and drinks for you to enjoy there. Opening the sliding doors there you will find our courtyard. From the common area there are two more hallways, the one on the left is where the women sleep and the one on the right is for the men."

How convenient.

"Each side has its own hot springs pool, although sir if I may," she says and leans in close to my ear, "I don't exactly condone…extracurricular activities, but if I don't find out, everything is ok in my book."

"Excuse me?" I huff.

"Say, if you were to go to the women's side and do som-"

"I get it, I get it…" I cough.

"Lovely!" she says gleefully and heads back to the lobby area.

I make my way to the common area and I'm greeted with a rather unpleasant scene. Everyone seems to be having a bad time; they seem to have gone through a lot of food and drinks already, but no one is smiling. Twyla's sleeping with her head resting on Edelwiess' stomach who is wearing an oversized yukata. Quite the funny picture, a giant lizard wearing a robe. But the small smile it generates quickly leaves my face. Everyone else seems to be sitting around a big table on the floor. Turning my head a bit to the side I see Hotoka, crying in silence as she leans on Elina.

"Al," Ruri huffs while rising what looks like a wine glass.

I wave at her with a smile but ultimately realize they probably already know about what happened. After all, Siren already knew, I hate to be the bummer but I'm more often than not found in this position.

"Al, you are back!" Eli says and stands up.

She runs towards me and once she reaches me she stands on her tiptoes to give me a kiss. I kiss her back but straighten rather suddenly. She stares at me and her eyes become glass. A sob escapes her and she hugs me tightly.

"Hey, where's Regi?" she asks, trying to distract herself.

I breathe out deeply and place my left hand over Eli's head. I ruffle her hair slightly and noticing my body language she backs away. Her expression only tells me she already figured it out.

"Owl and Regi…are dead," I announce.

Esra is sitting in a corner with her back to the wall, resting her head against it as she sighs deeply. Her eyes have glazed over, and it looks like she is trying not to cry again.

"It's my fault, I messed up…I didn't know where we took off to…I…I…" Hotoka cries, "I'm sorry, Al…I said I would keep an eye on him and I didn't."

Her feelings get the best of her and she starts crying over the table, she shields her head and refuses to let anyone see her face.

"It wasn't your fault," I clarify, "It wasn't anybody's. He surely wanted to help, we just didn't realize they were waiting for us. Regi and Owl…died trying to help us escape."

I try not to go into detail, mainly because I don't want to, but also because the real scenario was far too brutal.

"Those fucking Snakes!" Kayla yells as she hits the table.

"Dammit…" Siren mutters.

"Why can't we just be left in peace?" Twyla says.

She curls into a ball and continues to rest on Edelwiess' belly. She breathes in deeply and sighs. In all this time I've never seen her this devoid of energy. The sight of her so uncharacteristically down hurts.

"What are we going to do?" Eli asks.

"We'll lay low for a while," I state, "By the way, these are our new members."

Everyone immediately turns to look at the three "strangers". Aereth is standing up, leaning against the nearby wall. He's definitely the silent type, but right now it would better if he wasn't trying to act this cold. Aeri is sitting at the table next to Ruri and Kayla holding the small girl still.

"Aeri, Aereth and…" I say, staling since I don't know the girl's name.

"Sinna," Aeri helps me.

"Sinna," I repeat slowly.

I bring up my menu and quickly send the guild invites to them. Aeri quickly accepts the invite and the small girl slowly does so as well.

"Are we really doing this?" Aereth asks.

"Do what you want," Aeri says somewhat harshly.

"Please stay," Sinna pleads.

The man sighs and holding a hand against his temple he accepts to join my guild. I set out to get only two people back and got three. Out of those three only one was one of the ones I wanted back. This will do though, we can only get stronger…or at least I hope so.

Kayla stands up with a very pained expression. She is not crying, though; she is mad, she is very mad. She holds a clear glass of some kind of alcohol and raises it in front of her.

"To Owl and Regi…" she says.

Ruri stands up with her glass and does the same.

"To Owl and Regi."

Slowly everyone follows suit, Esra, Elina, Twyla, Hotoka, Siren, even Aereth and the small girl Sinna. Aeri is the last to rise from the floor and somewhat reluctantly pours herself two mugs of ale. She hands me one and raises her mug towards me.

"To Owl and Regi," she says.

I stare at my mug for a few seconds, looking at the reflection of a defeated man in my drink. I must not look like this, not in front of everyone. I pull some more composure and manage to without hesitation raise my drink.

"To Owl and Regi," I say firmly.

Afterwards we all proceed to down our drinks and after doing so we make the silent agreement to keep quiet for a bit. Eventually we all sit back down and after small chatter and introductions we run out of things to talk about. The girls decide to take a bath and head for bed, leaving me and Aereth alone.

"Hey, I'm sorry about your friend…" he says, "I only knew Regi but…he was a nice guy, probably the best I've known here."

"Both of them were the best of us…" I reply and finish yet another mug of ale.

"I think I'll take a bath as well," he says and stands up, "You coming?"

"I'm right behind you," I huff and pour myself more ale.

"Don't hit the drinks too hard," he mutters before going away.

Paying no attention to the man I drink a total of four more full mugs of ale and after the fourth I do the almost impossible task of standing up. Barely keeping myself from stumbling to the floor I support myself on the walls and manage to make it to the guy's room. It's a huge room with tatami floor and about a dozen futons all stacked in a corner. The room has one other door and it leads directly into the gigantic hot springs pool. From the entrance of the room I can feel the humidity and heat emanating from the pool. Ever so gallantly I undress as I make my way to the outdoors pool and grab a modesty towel that hangs from a rack in near the door that leads to the hot water. Ignoring the washing area I just do my best to reach the pool.

Gracefully I jump into the pool and once inside I sit somewhere around the middle of the gigantic thing. I cross my legs under me and set my hands on my knees as I let the warm water around my body. Surprisingly this water doesn't feel gooey or odd, it's just right. I look around the steamy pool and can't seem to locate Aereth. Maybe he decided not come in the end.

The water is just right, hot enough to sting a little if you move but also not enough to actually hurt. It's the kind of bath that will relax you to a near state of bliss. In a matter of minutes my body finds itself completely loose and relaxed. The added effect of my "drunkenness" somehow makes it all that more pleasing. My body feels numb and sluggish as I tread the water in front of me with my hand, it feels rather pleasant. I hang my head a little and look up at the sky. It's surprisingly pretty, sporting a visually striking shade of dark blue as some stray clouds cross the sky. I hear a splash of water behind me.

"Finally decided to join me?" I ask, slowly I turning around, still sitting. "Water's freaking great man."

To my surprise I do not see Aereth, Aeri stands at the very edge of the pool. She barely covers herself with a small towel while on the other hand she holds a small wooden tray.

"Hey…turn around, alright?" she says softly.

Immediately and splashing water like an idiot I turn my back on her and clear my throat loudly. My ear decides to turn into super sensitive mode and I start hearing as she gets closer to me, the water moving as she moves herself. Suddenly I feel a warm soft sensation all over my back. My head instinctively turns a little and I see her bare shoulder pressed against mine. She is sitting behind me, leaning her back on me.

"Aeri wh-"

"I brought sake," she interrupts.

Her arm slowly moves in into my peripheral vision and I see her push the small tray over to my side. It glides peacefully over the water over to my side and I take hold of it. It holds two big bottles of "sake" and two little cups to serve the liquor on. I take hold of one of the bottles, the weight as I lift it indicates that it's completely full. I fill up the two cups and grab one.

"Here," I huff as I move my hand over my shoulder.

Her hand meets mine over her shoulder, her fingers grace mine and she lingers for a few seconds before taking the cup from my hand.

"Thanks."

I grab my cup myself and take a small sip out of it, it's quite strong and dry. I cough a bit after taking the small sip and Aeri chuckles.

"Come on, drink like a man," she teases.

After saying that I can see on the corner of my eye how she swings her head back a bit, drinking all of the little cup in one go. Humoring her I do the same and once I down the potent drink I place my cup on the floating tray. I slide it over back to her.

"Now you serve," I say.

I can feel how she moves behind me. She keeps resting on my back and naturally I just lean back as well, keeping a balance that allows us to sit straight. I feel her tap my shoulder and I bring my hand up to take the cup away from her. I stare into the liquid for brief moment and then bump heads a little with Aeri as we drink our "shot" of sake. We both chuckle after finishing our drinks.

"How are you doing?" she asks as she slides the tray over to my side.

"Heh, like you said, things could be better," I say and pour our drinks once again, "There's really nothing I can do about it…"

We take a brief pause and drink together, yet again. I push the tray over to her.

"This only time will heal," I say, "I just gotta make sure nothing like it happens…again."

"It's not your fault though…" she says softly, "shit happens."

"Well, shit happens too often," I mutter.

And we drink.

"Will you…will you go and start killing those dudes in black?" I ask, hoping she says no.

"I…I want to, Klaus is still alive…but I don't know if I should. I need to take care of Sinna," she says and shortly after chuckles, "I have to take care of you."

I chuckle as well and gently poke her sides with my elbow.

"I could…" I stammer, "I could use a second in command."

"And I could use a break, something peaceful…" she replies.

We continue our little dance of passing the tray back and forth, drinking one serving after the other. My vision at one point becomes as blurry as the steam that comes out the pool itself. We have half a bottle to go. We talk in between drinks and the brief chuckle escapes us as we switch between topics and catch up with each other. We've realized that neither of us can see each other properly so we now sit next to each other with our backs against the edge of the pool.

"So, you and Regi?" I ask.

Even through my hazy vision I can see her blush a little, more than she is already blushing anyways.

"Just for a little while," she mumbles.

"You are a frisky girl, huh?"

"Jesus, shut up, when you use that word it feels weird," she says and shoves me a little.

We laugh soundly for a little while and after a long sigh she leans her head on my chest. I pay it no mind for a second but then I feel quite alarmed. She gets closer and hugs me.

"Aeri, what are you doing?"

"I missed you Al," she says softly, "I missed you so much…"

"Hey, what are you doing?"

She slowly takes hold of my arms and pins them to the side. She sits herself over my legs and kisses my neck slowly. Within a second she is kissing my lips with force, pushing her body even closer. She is strong, she holds me down with such force that I can't even move. She is a bit desperate about the way she is doing it, breaking away forcefully from my mouth to breathe heavily before pressing her lips against mine again. Her tongue also takes on a little freedom and I just can't seem to move her. I struggle but manage to push her away, albeit a bit violently and stand up. I step back but trip over the edge of the pool and land on my back.

"What is wrong with you Aeri?" I ask.

"I'm sorry, I'm just…" she shakes her head wildly and I see her blurry figure stand up.

She covers herself up and at a brisk pace leaves through the men's wing of the inn.

"Sorry," she huffs embarrassed before leaving.

I sit up close to the edge and rub my forehead a little.

"What the hell was that?" I mumble.

"Beats me," Aereth answers.

"Huh, what? Where are you?"

"I've been here since you came in by yourself," he says.

I rub my eyes a little and try to make out anything through the steamy fog. Finally regaining my vision I see him raising his hand on the far edge of the pool, which is covered in a rather dense fog.

"So you heard everything?" I ask.

"And saw most of it too," he admits, "You guys went through those bottles pretty fast."

"It got kinda weird," I say.

"Dude it felt really weird from over here," he says.

"Oh shut up."

"Make me," he snaps.

"Bleh, whatever…" I resign.

"You seem very troubled, if I'm honest," he says and stands up.

"How can I not be? Two of my friends just died and I don't know how to fucking stop it from happening again…and now this shit…"

"You need to realize one thing…leader," he says.

"And what the hell is that?"

"You cannot fight the good fight, because there is none," he says.

"What?" I ask, confused.

"In here, you need to fight for yourself, for your own survival," he explains, "For your particular case you have to fight for these people and do so even harder."

"But what the hell do I fight for?" I ask.

"You just fight for yourselves. An outsider wouldn't agree; they'd think we fight for no greater good," he says, "No just cause."

"Just fight for ourselves?" I ask.

He nods.

"Look out for your own and no one else," he continues, "Or you could fight for revenge, dedicate every single breath you have left in this world to hunt those guys down. Of course, that cursor above your head could change."

"Revenge..." I ponder.

A rather somber take on the matter, but it's one option that has been lingering in my head ever since Daath's murder. Hunt them down and make them all pay. Can't really say I've never thought about it.

"I think I get it. Heh, you sounded cool for a second," I tease.

"I'll see you around kid," he says and leaves me alone in the steamy pool.

To fight only for ourselves…no matter the consequences. Or seek out revenge, dedicate our time in this damn prison only for revenge… no greater good, no just cause. Fight for our survival and peace of mind alone.

"I think I like the sound of that," I say with a smile.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter was beta-read by the godly eyes of DragonofAnnoth!

There always needs to be a chapter to unwind after bad things happen right? Or at least I would think so, the situation our characters are in is already dire so it would be mean to torture them even further. We are approaching the end of Arc three kind of excited about but something worries me which I will elaborate further down this note. I like to think my character chemistry is somewhat realistic but can't help to indulge in the fact that I can use several anime tropes to make them interact. Which is fun and after all a friend of mine always tells me my story has this glaring characteristics that make it feel like an anime. Or maybe he is just too jaded by his own action fanfiction which you can find in the Halo section of this site. Proud of the guy, his fic is the biggest and most popular in his section, despite having ended a while ago. So go there and check out "The Life" it's a good, loooong read. Well enough of whatever this paragraph turned into haha.

**IC0: **Hehe, you make me feel so good about myself with that comment haha thank you. But yeah stuff is getting dark and we might dwell into darker places soon. Hopefully this chapter gives a bit of a breather to the ominous aspect of things. **rfpauli: **Glad to see you enjoyed the first little extra chapter, hopefully the chapters from here out will also feature them as you can see below haha. **Steve the man:** ITS BEEN FAR TOO LONG! I kid but yeah, you see what happens when you stop reviewing? I kill people. I kid, glad to see one of your reviews again.

Now to address that worry I mentioned. While I do have up to chapter 48 already planned (think about it as I already have the storyboard for them)...I'm yet to write anything past 46. This is slightly worrying. As I may have already mentioned most of this fic was already written in months of advance between each chapter. But lately due to school and I won't excuse my own laziness I have been lagging behind with the writing of further chapters. There is an ending planned for this fic after all as I already said I would want to avoid this story to become one of those 100+ chapter things. Hence why I try to make every chapter significant, as you may know I have but one chapter that I consider filler in this story and I thoroughly apologized for it haha. The point I'm trying to get to here. One of two things will happen in the coming weeks. **ONE:** I manage to catch up in writing and the story continues with it's weekly updates schedule. Update son Sundays at eleven bla bla bla. Basically nothing happens. Or the following could happen. **TWO:** I can't catch up with my writing as successfully as I want to and thus I leave this story in a two weeks tops hiatus to be able to write more calmly and get a lot if not a few weeks worth of chapters done to later return to the weekly updates. Next Sunday's chapter is guaranteed as it's already done but after next Sunday I'm yet to finish coming chapters. SO yeah I just wanted to get that off my chest. Hopefully...you guys don't get too mad at me if things come to worse but I'll be sure to tell you all before I take a decision.

Sorry for this particularly long AN. As always if you like what you read or just want to comment on something. Please leave a review, I very much enjoy reading what you have to say about my story. I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Cry Havoc"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 2.- Peeping**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad - Sylvie Inn**

**Elina**

"I mean come on, he is your boyfriend isn't he?" Ruri teases.

"He is..bu-but we've never really done anything like that," I reply.

"For real?" she pushes

"Yeah, now shut up, they'll hear you," I plead as I turn to look at the pool.

We've decided to take a bath and try to unwind, it's been a tough day and everyone would just rather forget about it in its entirety. Everyone is done washing themselves but us but I blame Ruri for stalling me with her constant barrage of questions. Hanging around with Ruri more often than not means divulging in inappropriate subjects and without fail we ended up talking about what she wanted.

I finish soaping up my body and reach forwards to fill my small bucket with hot water. Ruri does the same but she keeps staring at me with a weird smile. I cover my chest and slightly turn my body away from her.

"Stop being such a perv, jeez…" I complain.

"It's not that," she replies.

"Then what is it?"

"You've been with Al for how long now?" she asks.

"Like, uh…officially?"

"Sure," she says and spills the bucket I filled with water over her head, washing the soap away from her body.

I pout at her and take the bucket once she sets it back on the floor. I fill it back up again and pour the water over myself before she has any chance to do anything funny again. I breathe out slowly, concentrating more on the feeling of the water enveloping my body for its brief course to the ground than her question.

"Ten months…?" I answer slowly.

"Wow, and you haven't done anything naug-" she starts but is swiftly interrupted by Kayla delivered a strong slap to the back of her head.

"Don't pressure Elina idiot, let her take it at her own pace," Kayla says.

"You didn't mind me speeding up your pace a little," Ruri purrs towards Kayla.

I find myself blushing really hard, so much that I want to cover my face but instead I resort into staring at myself in the small mirror on top of the water spout in front of me. Does Al want something like that from me? I mean, he is a boy; he absolutely does…but have I been too prude about it?

"Dammit, you got her thinking about it now," Kayla huffs and flicks Ruri's forehead.

"Stop the domestic abuse!" Ruri says dramatically.

"What should I do?" I ask.

"Nothing, Eli, take it at your own pace," Kayla explains, "No reason to rush things."

"Or you could, go into the men's bath right and offer to wash his back," Ruri says, unable to keep a small laugh from escaping her after her sentence.

"No, jeez shut up," Kayla butts in, "Eli you don't have to do that, no one does that, it's some creepy shit you only see in anime and stuff."

"You know how to shut me up," Ruri teases as she perks up her lips and closes her eyes.

Kayla rolls her eyes and pinches Ruri's lips. Ruri starts complaining, but all she can do is wave her arms around in distress.

"Don't listen to her Eli, just go about it at your pace," she stresses.

"Bu-but it's almost been a year and we really haven't done anything," I stammer, "I mean we kiss and stuff and we sleep together but we are yet to…to…"

I feel like I might've blown a fuse and end up closing my lips tight as I start filling my bucket with cold water. Rushing a bit I don't even close the spout and pour the ice cold water over myself.

"Christ, leave her alone," Esra says loudly.

"You heard?" I ask, embarrassed.

"We all did," Siren and Hotoka answer in unison.

I cover my face with my hands and squirm in agony. I can't believe it, they all know now. Ruri frees herself from Kayla's pinching fingers to cower behind me. She grabs my shoulders and with inspiring air lifts her right hand to strike a pose.

"No need to worry, my beautifully petite friend, I know what can bring that spice back to your romantic life!" she says.

"And what is that?" Siren asks.

"Guys, come on, leave Eli alone," Kayla insists.

"No, wait I wanna know!" I interrupt.

Ruri shoots me a devious grin and comes closer to my ear. Even before she starts speaking I can feel huge goose bumps run down my spine.

* * *

I should've listened to Kayla; what the hell am I doing? I look down at my current attire and sigh deeply. I get a better hold of the towel I carry and pinch a little at the school swimsuit Ruri gave me.

"Why on earth did she have this?" I mumble, "And why is it my size?"

I stop and realize I'm already halfway through the men's corridor. I guess there is no backing out now. I mean I do sort of want to do something about this but I'm very nervous…

"He-hey can I wash you back?!" I rehearse, "No that's not right…May I wash your back?"

My head starts spinning and I decided to stop my talking as I set foot on the men's sleeping area. Turning my head a little I immediately make out the men's hotsprings. Sneakily I approach the outdoors area when I notice two figures sitting by the edge of the pool. Panicking I jump behind the sliding doors and hide myself there. Oh my god, no. That new guy Aereth should also be here, I'm so dumb.

"Aeri, what are you doing?"

Huh?

I poke my head out and see Aeri straddling Al by the edge of the pool. She desperately kisses him and I start strangling my poor towel. My eyes open wide with shock and I can feel the edge of my eyes starting to tear up. What is she doing? What is he doing? I close my eyes forcefully and can only make out Aeri's loud kissing thanks to my straining. No, no, why isn't he doing anything? I breathe out in a whimper and force myself to take another peek.

"What is wrong with you, Aeri?!" Al screams as he pushes her away.

"Yes!" I sing to myself, "Push that woman away from you!"

Al falls on his back as he pushes her away and falls outside of the pool. Aeri grabs her very small towel and covers herself as much as she is able before starting to look around nervously.

"I'm sorry, I'm just…" she stutters.

I can just stare at her with a frown. What…what in the hell was she thinking? He is my boyfriend, not hers.

"Sorry," she says again and storms out.

I hide back behind the sliding doors and watch her prance around half naked. She goes past me without even noticing me and speeds down through the corridor. Confused, mad, and embarrassed I cover my head and ears for a while. What were they doing?! Why were they in the same bath together?! I was supposed to be the one with him. As I stop freaking out I hear more footsteps and keep myself close to the doors. Aereth passes by and I can't help but to cover my eyes as he does. Once I think he is gone I sneak into the outdoors area and see Al sitting on the edge of the pool. Breathing rapidly I drop the towel and run towards him.

"Yo-you idiot!" I yell and push him into the water.

I cross my arms and stand on the very edge of the pool as I watch him turn around, looking confused.

"Eli…shit, Elina! What are you doing here?" he says, his voice cracking in the progress.

"What was she doing here?!" I ask.

"Aeri –fuck- I can explain," He says.

"You better start!"

"She is being super weird, I didn't know what to do, she came in here and started talking to me but then she started kissing me and I couldn't get her off of me," he says, "Come on Eli, I wouldn't do shit like that."

I jump into the pool and walk over to him, tears flooding my eyes for some reason.

"You are dumb!" I huff.

"Hey, hey," he says and pulls me down.

He hugs me tight and I start pouting as he holds me.

"I wanna hit you in the face," I mumble, "really hard."

"Well, I'll let you if it'll make you feel better," he says with a laugh, "I'm sorry Eli, I wouldn't do that, I love you, only you."

Feeling a bit more at ease I wrap my arms around him and stop pouting.

"Can I hit her?" I ask as innocently as I can.

"Heh, sure, just not too hard," he says, "She isn't in a good place right now."

"Ok," I say with a smile and keep hugging him as the warm water surrounds us.

"What are you doing here anyways?" he asks.

It suddenly sinks in that I'm hugging his naked body as I'm in this massive pool of hot water. I freeze for a moment before harshly detaching myself from him.

"I….I…uhm, I…" I stutter and cover my eyes.

"Haha, hey it's alright," he says.

"No, no, shut up!" I shout and push him away, "This was all Ruri's fault!"

I run inside the men's room and see Aereth sitting down on the floor with a cup of tea. He still hasn't bothered to put any clothes on. A single eyebrow rises on his face.

"Uh, hi?" he says.

"Ahh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"


	45. Chapter 45 - Cry Havoc

**Chapter 45.- Cry Havoc**

**November/5****th****/2023**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Thickwoods – Sylvie Inn**

**Aeri**

"What do you think though?" I ask.

"Well, such items do exist, but I doubt that they have so many…" Argo says.

"Forty spots then?"

"Yeah, give or take. They are rallying enough people for a raid party. But it sounds dangerous; they're being really secretive about it," she explains, "I haven't kept tabs on the progress of that floor lately but…it just feels off."

"Is anyone else joining that party, or is it just red players being thrown into the fire?" I ask.

"Beats me. Hey…think about it alright? Don't just jump on the opportunity."

"If there's a chance I need to take it," I state.

"Well, just…be careful," she says, "It all just feels fishy."

Eager to leave, she turns around and disappears almost instantly into the thick forest. Al and Argo aren't on the best of terms lately. Considering what she told me, they are in very bad terms actually. It's still a bit hard to believe that Al did what he did to her just to find me.

"Why change the cursor though?"

I turn around to see that blurry silhouette that wears my face again. Annoyed I refuse to look at it but it quickly places itself in-front of me in the blink of an eye.

"I mean, after all, you do enjoy the killing," it says with a grin.

"Shut up…" I mumble.

"Hey! Speak up! If you mumble that quietly, no one can assume that you're crazy," It teases. I try my best to ignore it, but the sarcasm of the thing ticks me off.

I turn around and walk down the inn's hallway to the common area. Once I come inside the room I can see Ruri and Kayla getting probably a little too comfortable with each other. Kayla jerks back and half-flails away from Ruri's face once she sees me. Ruri just tries to get back to kissing her lover.

"Aeri…uh, good morning," Kayla stammers, trying to stiff-arm Ruri, with only partial success.

"Good morning you two," I reply.

My sight flickers past them to that black clad figure, mockingly standing behind Ruri and Kayla.

"You know, these two do know how to get it on," it says.

I shake my head and keep going, trying to make it into the courtyard. I exit through the sliding doors and sit on the edge of a few steps that lead out to a really pretty yard.

"Hey, don't run away like that," it huffs, "After all, weren't you drooling into Al's mouth just a few days ago?"

My mind goes back to just a few days ago and how I was all over Al. I ignore it's mocking and just look at the green grass, watching the wind blowing through it, causing it to sway. I need to get a hold of myself.

"Hey, Aeri?"

I turn around quickly and see Elina cautiously approaching me. I glance around myself, trying to find that shadow, but it seems to be nowhere in sight.

"Good morning Eli…" I mumble.

"Are you ok?" she asks.

"Yeah...yeah," I huff.

She sits next to me and starts awkwardly playing with her fingers. I haven't spent as much time as I would like with her in the past few days. I've been busy with Sinna and myself to be honest. I need to be there for Sinna more than anyone else right now but at the same time I fear for my own sanity.

"I've been meaning to say something…" she stammers.

"What is it?"

"I…uh…" she huffs and swallows her own saliva, looking awfully anxious, "I…I saw you kissing Al!"

My hair stands on edge and I feel as my cheeks go ruby with blood. At a lack of words I just stare at her, she looks a bit mad but at the same time there's a trace of embarrassment in her face. She locks her eyes with mine and her eyebrow burrows slightly making an angry expression I have never seen in her face, let alone directed at me.

"She did what?" Ruri butts in from the side of the sliding door.

"Shut up Ruri!" Elina yells as she stands up with both of her fists closed.

"Hey I was just kiddi-"

"No, shut up and go inside!" Eli insists.

"Sorry..." Ruri whimpers.

"Elina…I'm sorry I don't know what came over me," I try to excuse myself.

"You obviously didn't," she snaps.

She is trying really hard to appear mad, and it's almost cute, but I clearly crossed a line. I can only hope the words coming out of her mouth aren't just pure anger but her reaction to me stepping in what is quite literally her territory.

"Wait, I can explain I swear…," I say and stand up, trying to back away from her a little, "Wait! How did you see me?"

"I was going to wash hi-" she mutters, but stopping herself in midsentence, "That is none of your business! Why were you all over him?!"

"Hehe, are you gonna tell her?" I hear that mocking voice mutter behind me.

"I'm sorry, we were drinking and I uh…" I reply, my pathetic excuse trailing off into nothingness.

"Ooh…that's a crappy excuse," it continues.

"Are you fu-," Elina stops for a second, "Freaking kidding me? Is your excuse really that you were drunk? We don't even GET drunk!"

"Yes…?" I stutter.

"Woah. Come on, I've seen you lie. What's up with all the shitty excuses?" the shadowy figure asks.

Elina in a weird fit pushes me and walks past me. Fuming, she stalks to the middle of the courtyard and turns to look at me. I feel odd at her sudden physicality. I take a step back but in the end decide to walk over to her.

"Eli, I'm sorry ok, I don't know what happened," I say.

I'm about a foot or two away from her when a duel invite appears in front of my face. In the wake of a flash of light Elina sports a slick looking short blade and an azure buckler. Her frown is slightly scary and I'm left feeling quite strange. Never have I seen her display this kind of emotions. It's somewhat unsettling, not to say scary.

"Half-loss mode, huh?" the voice ponders, "You sure made her mad; our little pure-hearted Elina wants a chance at beating your face in."

"Elina…can't we talk this over? I'm so sorry," I plead.

"I'm…I'm not mad…" she mutters, "I am but…but I just want to hit you or something!"

I look around and see that basically everyone has gathered to look at the ruckus. A scolded Ruri sits next to Kayla while Hotoka and Siren just idly stand next to the sliding door. Just now I notice Aereth, leisurely sunbathing on the slanted roof of the inn. He sits up slowly and focuses his attention on us. Ever so conveniently Al, and Esra also walk outside, curious as to what is happening. Lastly the girl Twyla appears by jumping into the courtyard from the outside of the inn. I clear my throat and turn back to Elina.

"Why though…? I'm sure we can just talk it out," I propose.

"No we can't! He is mi-mine…not yours!" she says and blushes hard.

"Awww," Ruri exclaims.

"Shut up Ruri!" Elina yells, her voice almost breaking.

"Come on, give the girl a chance to smack you around a little bit," the voice chuckles.

I accept the duel and the sixty second timer appears above our heads. I start getting ready when all of the sudden a puff of white smoke breaks out to my left. I cover my mouth and nose and fan my free hand in-front of me; the damn smoke is dense.

"Hello and welcome, ladies and gentlemen!" Sylvianna cheers as she comes out of the thick smoke.

The blonde Elf twirls around on her feet and extends a hand towards Elina and myself.

"Today for the first time in three hundred years, we have a duel in our lovely courtyard!" she sings, "A battle of passion between two girls, for the heart of our resident guild leader himself!"

"Wait no, you got that wrong!" I shout.

"I will be taking any bets that want to be placed as of right now, forty seconds on the clock!" Sylvianna announces.

Aereth jumps down from the roof, shirtless and with an annoying smile on his face he walks over to Sylvianna.

"I wanna put a thousand col on the small girl," he says.

"You are betting against me?!" I yell.

"Well yeah, just look at that beast over there," he says and points past me.

Elina is raring up to go, her sword is already shining and she is doing small steps front and backwards to get ready.

"I'm putting down a thousand on the redhead," Hotoka says as she approaches the elf.

"Hey, hey, I wanna bet two thousand on Elina!" Ruri yells and runs towards Sylvianna.

"I don't wanna take sides on this…but my money goes on Aeri," Kayla mutters as she stands up.

"Ten seconds to go!" the elf announces as she receives the col from everyone else.

Everyone but Al and Twyla bet money and I find myself without my gauntlets equipped as the timer reaches its last five seconds.

"And we are starting!" Sylvianna yells and another puff of white smoke appears as the timer hits zero.

The thickness of the cloud prevents me from seeing Elina and slowly through my menu I equip both of my gauntlets. I see a faint flash a midst the smoke and roll to the side. Barely dodging Eli's first attack I see her drive her sword straight into the ground and yank out quickly.

"Wow, this girl is itching to hit you," the shadow says.

I raise my hands a little and try to get into a defensive stance. I don't want to hit Elina, even if she is just doing this to let out steam. She swings at me without a skill and I easily catch her blade with my left hand. Not wasting a second she swings her other arm, trying to hit me with her buckler. I grab her other hand as well and hold her still.

"Hey, come on, we can stop this, right?" I ask.

She shakes her head and jumps up, she drop kicks me in the stomach, making me let go off her hands. I'm pushed back by her kick and raise my guard up again.

"This is great, she really is out to hit you for kissing her man."

"Shut up," I mumble to myself.

Her sword flashes and she lunges at me, swerving a little with every step she makes. She is making it hard for me to grab her sword again. Not taking any chance I step to the side as she gets closer and harshly kick her out of the way once she is going past me. She wipes out into the ground and I bring my hands up to flinch a little.

"Oh shit, I'm sorry," I mutter as I approach her.

She detaches her buckler and throws it at me like a frisbee. Surprised I don't get time to dodge and it hits me right in the face. She gets up quickly and slashes my side with a quick swing. Before retreating to a safe distance she also stabs my back with a quick poke. With only three attacks she manages to drop my health points down to ninety percent. I could easily win the duel but I don't want to attack her.

"Come on, why aren't you attacking?" Elina complains.

"Yeah, why?" the voice grumbles, sounding utterly disappointed.

"I don't want to hurt you Eli, I'm sorry, can't you just forgive me?" I beg.

"I can…I will!" she says, "But first I wanna beat you!"

"My, my, she is truly, disgustingly, all sweet and shit," it presses, "She only wants to smack you around a little and go back to normal. What a meek, pathetic, girl. I would rip you head off if you did the same to me. Speaking of beheadings and paramours, who kissed better, Daath, Regi or Al?"

I'm conflicted by the words I hear, pure, unfiltered hatred. I've been struggling to figure out what this entity is, but I have come to accept it's somehow me…she sounds like me, she looks like me, she could for all intents and purposes be me…

Am I really such a horrible person deep inside?

"Ok ok…I think I understand," I reply.

"Ok, then fight back," Elina says.

"I won't hold back though," I state firmly.

"Now that's more like it," the thing seethes.

I jump towards Elina and raise my right hand up. I feel my whole arm vibrating and slash down on top of her. She moves to the side barely escaping my attack and my hand slams against the floor, cracking it in the process. She swiftly slashes at me once again and then rolls towards her buckler to recover it.

"I gotta say, you really have improved," I comment, "The last time I saw you, I thought you would've given up on leveling up."

"You think so?" she asks with beaming eyes, but they narrow just as quickly "Wait, that felt backhanded!"

"Maybe just a little bit," I huff and dash to her again.

I get in close and kick her knee, she stumbles back slightly and with a skill I punch her in the gut. The blowback is a bit harder with a skill so my hit makes her skid back on her own feet for a few meters. I should be done in a few more hits.

"That's not fair, what level are you?" she complains and raises her guard up a bit.

"Sixty," I answer.

"Holy crap, really?!" Ruri yells from the sidelines.

"Impressive," I hear Hotoka utter.

"Really?" Elina asks in disbelief, tilting her head in the process.

"Yeah…" I repeat myself.

She lifts her hand and throws something at me, and my hand snaps up to catch it. I turn my hand over to look at it and realize too late it's a smoke bomb. It blows up on my face and I find myself coughing with no signs of stopping.

"What is it with these damned smokescreens, huh?" The shadow complains.

I feel my robe come a bit loose and as I struggle with the coughing I clutch at my own clothes to keep them from slipping off. The smoke dissipates and I see Elina proudly holding the lace of my yukata. She swings it around a few times and then with a chuckle teases me flaunting it in my direction. I hear a shriek of excitement escape Ruri's mouth followed by Kayla scolding her perverted girlfriend.

"Ow, ow, ow, wait, wait, I wanna see," Ruri whines as Kayla drags her into the inn by her ear.

I blush slightly as I feel the robe slipping a little from the top. With my shoulders exposed I kneel on the ground and quickly reset the robe on its place. I stay on the floor with my arms crossed over my clothing.

"What are you doing?!" I ask embarrassed.

"I want you to forfeit," she says.

"Why?" I whine in high pitched tone, "I thought you wanted me to fight back."

"Yeah but I can't beat you when I'm eight levels under you, so I decided I'm actually not even gonna try."

"Oh that's low, she can't take you head on so she strips your ass down," the thing huffs, "Here I was getting excited over this fight…"

"Fine, fine, give me that back, this thing is all loose," I say.

With a few swipes on my menu I forfeit the duel and Elina is declared the winner.

"Fuck this, you can't have fun around here," it says dryly and disappears out of sight.

With a smile Elina approaches me and crouches just in front of my face. She extends to me the missing part of my robe and smiles even wider.

"I'm sorry, that was a little mean," she says.

"It's alright, I stepped out of line," I mutter, not being able to meet her eyes.

"It's ok…kinda…I mean I'm a bit mad, but I'm not about to lose a friend like you for something like that," she explains.

That self-loathing inside me just becomes bigger and I stare at the ground.

"I'm really sorry," I say,

"It's ok, just, don't kiss my boyfriend again," she says.

Her words are sweet, but somehow manage to be tinted with a little anger. It's odd. She stands to walk away but I decide to stay a little on the ground. I look around slowly, but that shadow is nowhere to be found. I breathe in deeply and stand up. Everyone seems to have gone back to whatever they were doing, and Aereth is casually lying on the roof without a shirt as he continues to soak up the sun.

"I saw you were talking with Argo."

I turn around and see Al, slowly approaching me. The embarrassment has not completely left my being and his very presence makes me look away.

"Yeah…"

"How is she?" he asks.

"She is alright, although, she isn't very keen on seeing you anytime soon," I explain.

"Yeah…I won't hold it against her…" he trails off.

"I'm going to meet up with the clearers…" I say softly, "Well it's mainly the Army, other parties seem to not want to participate."

Silence lingers between us for a while. He shifts in his stance a little not much but enough for me to catch on how awkward this situation feels.

"What for?" he asks.

"Argo said, they are looking for red players to help them out," I say.

"What's in it for them?"

"They said anyone who survives the boss they will hand out items to revert the red player status," I explain.

"That doesn't sound fishy at all," he says, with that tone of sarcasm I've grown to miss.

I smile gently and tilt my head.

"I gotta try, Al," I murmur.

"I'm not going to be able to change your mind right?" he asks.

I shake my head and he smiles.

"I'll see you when you get back then," he says.

He's changed so much, I would even say he is a bit cooler than before in all ways. I'm glad that he expects me to come back, but it's been ages since I fought a boss and I would be lying if I said I wasn't scared.

"Come on, kiss him," the voice comes back, teasing.

"Yeah, I'll see you then," I say.

He starts walking away to meet up with Elina and I restrain the urge to pull him and make him face my way. Instead I speak softly.

"Don't tell anyone alright?"

He stops in his tracks and nods without even looking at me. My worries are somewhat laid to rest and I'm able to breathe a bit more freely.

"Are you gonna tell Sinna?" the voice asks.

"I don't know," I reply.

"My, my, did you just acknowledge my existence?"

"I might as well, unless you would rather leave forever," I huff.

"I'm not going anywhere, until you get your shit together. Or even then I might decide to stay around."

"What to call you though?"

"You really want to name me?" it questions, "Wouldn't you rather not tell everyone that you've gone mad?"

"Mirai," I say firmly.

The shadowy figure smiles widely and crosses its arms.

"Appropriate," she answers and in an instant disappears.

"Would it be right of me to assume that something troubles you?" Sylvianna ponders appearing seemingly out of nowhere.

Surprised I jump back a little and raise my guard up. Once I realized it was nothing but the NPC I relax.

"You are rather nosy, you know that?"

"It comes from the years of being completely and utterly alone," she replies while checking out her nails, "I won't bother you then."

The elf leaves gracefully and I start making my way to the girls sleeping area. Sinna hasn't been ok, not since Regi. I try to talk to her, to make her smile but she always prefers to go and sleep. It's been going on for a few days now and it somehow feels worse than when her sister died. There's no way it is as bad, but I think everything that has happened to her has finally started showing its weight. I slide the door leading to the room and find a single futon still on the floor. Just like when I woke up, she is still curled up into a ball, hiding under the covers.

"Sinna," I say softly.

She doesn't answer, she merely moves a little and I can see her curl even further.

"Sinna, hey, can I join you for a bit?"

"Sure…" she mutters.

I come closer and lift the covers, finally revealing her small figure with red eyes and a sorrowful expression. I place myself next to her and also cover my head. She inches her way closer to me and hugs me. I wrap my arms around her and I start rubbing her back with intent of helping her find some solace.

"I will be going away for the rest of today, maybe tomorrow too," I say.

I can feel her back away a little, she lifts her head and looks at me for a brief second. Later she buries her face in my embrace again.

"Why?"

"I have to do something, to help Al with the guild," I answer.

"Are you coming back?"

"Of course I am."

"You won't leave me too, right? She asks, clearly crying, "You will stay with me, right?"

"Oh boy, that's a tall order considering what you want to do," Mirai comments.

I grind my teeth and hold Sinna tighter.

"I'll stay with you forever, I swear," I huff.

"Please don't lie to me," she cries, "I'm tired of people lying to me!"

"Sweetie, I'll be back just try not to wor-"

"First sis, now Regi…" she cuts me off, "I don't want to be alone…"

I stay silent and just hold her closer. She starts crying louder and digs her nails into my back. As her hold on me gets harsher I just do my best to hold her still.

"I don't want more people that I love to die…" she murmurs in-between her cries, "I know I'm…I'm just a kid but I know what it means when other people die! It means I don't get to see them again, it means being sad! It means being alone!"

"Have fun with your little bundle of joy," Mirai says and I feel her sarcastic, and definitely sadistic presence lift from the room.

"I won't leave you, Sinna," I say.

"But you are leaving right now…" she replies.

I bite my lip and clear my throat.

"I know…but I'll be coming back, if you want to talk just send me messages. I'll answer right away," I say trying to make her feel better.

I keep patting her back and holding her close as she cries, I won't leave her alone, but I have to do this. I hold her and eventually after she cried her eyes out for yet another day she seems to have drifted into sleep. Trying not to wake her up I get up from the futon and quietly leave the inn.

* * *

**Forty-eight Floor of Aincrad – Lindarth**

"So what would you say are the odds of even coming back alive?" Mirai huffs, "You know, considering the scenario you are so eagerly jumping into."

"I'll be alright," I mutter.

I stop in front of a group of a people. They've all gathered around outside the biggest inn in Lindarth. A modest sea of red cursors lies between me and an Army representative along with a member of the Knights of The Blood judging by her colors.

"Everyone calm down, only forty spots will be available and these spots are strictly reserved for people above level fifty five!" the Army representative yells.

With that simple sentence the mass of people is easily cut into a third of its size. With the crowd dispersing I'm able to get a bit closer and look at the two people trying to keep us red players under control. The Army guy is pretty much your regular jarhead, dressed in steel from head to toe along with those oddly futuristic helmets that ever so slightly resemble a Nervegear. The one who strikes out for me the most is the girl from Knights of The Blood. Chestnut hair, pretty and smooth looking. She looks fragile, but also beautiful; perhaps I'm focusing too much on her.

"Hmm, staring aren't we?" Mirai teases.

"What of it?" I snap.

"Nothing, nothing," she says with a chuckle.

The girl stands next to the Army representative with a frown; she seems upset but isn't really voicing any concerns. The Army jarhead starts counting us with his finger, once I feel him place his damn finger over me I get a bit irked.

"I guess we can part with forty one," he says, "Now we should establish a raid leader, is anyone above level fifty seven?"

I raise my hand along with just one other guy. He wears a red coat and has his hair customized to look gray. Turning his head he quickly fixes his sight on me and grins widely. I roll my eyes and let my hand go down slowly. Some bullshit is about to happen, I know it.

"Ok, you two," the Army representative says, "Come on up."

"How exciting, we're already making new friends," Mirai sings and skips ahead of me.

I make my way to the front of the small crowd, no shortage of stink eye and judging eyes find their way to me. I try to brush it off, but it's never been this bad. Green players looking at you like the plague feels less menacing than when red players do it.

"Now, you two should have a duel, first hit rules," the army man says, "That should settle who is more proficient."

"Fine by me," the guy with gray hair says.

"Hey, uh, you sure this is the only way?" I ask.

"It's the fastest way to determine who is better," jarhead says.

"Huh, don't tell me you are scared," my rival spits.

I hear Mirai laugh ghoulishly and her voice quickly fades away in the back of my head.

"Oh, hehe, don't misunderstand; I'm just afraid I might hurt you," I grin.

I bring down my menu and quickly lock him into my duel queue, my finger slightly hovers over the half loss mode but I quickly raise it to select the first hit rules. I send the invite and start walking back a few steps. The crowd disperses around and quickly forms a circle around us. The girl from the KOB suddenly takes interest and still with a hard to amuse expression takes a front row seat to the fight. I look up a bit and finally notice this idiot's name. Billfray. Stupid sounding as expected.

I equip my gauntlets and stretch a little. I open and close my fists as I regulate my breathing. After a bit I open my eyes and see the timer reaching its last ten seconds.

"Where's your sword, princess?" Billfray asks.

"I don't use swords," I answer.

"You trying to mock me?"

"Maybe," I tease.

"Oh man I'll enjoy winning this freaking thing," he says.

"Well that, you can try," I answer.

The timer reaches zero and he starts running at me, his sword blazing a deep shade of blue as he charges towards me. I stand still, trying to keep as calm and collected as I'm able to. I stare at his blade, his pose, the way he is running towards me. This will be easy. About three feet away from me he swings his blade over my head and I raise my hand to block it. The impact sends shockwaves through my hand. I place my right foot back and swinging my body forwards punching him across the face. He lets go of his blade and plummets on his back, skidding a few feet away from me. I let go of his sword and dust off my hands.

"Are we done here?" I ask.

"Ye-yes," jarhead stutters, "I guess you'll be leading these guys into hell, what's your name?"

"Aeri," I huff, "Pay more attention, bud; it literally was written in the sky seconds ago."

He coughs and extends his hand to the KOB member as if presenting her.

"She will be supervising you, in case you need to reach us and in order to acknowledge how many of you will be getting the items."

The girl approaches me with her arms crossed and stares at me for a moment before extending her hand.

"My name is Asuna," she says.

"Aeri," I huff and shake her hand.

Her eyes seem to be in a whole different mood than her face. I keep my hand clutched around her's for a few seconds as I try to figure her out.

"I, uh, you can let go," she says.

"Yeah, sorry," I excuse myself.

"I recommend you start dividing these players into groups according to their stats and-"

"Yeah, I have sort of an idea; I helped clear the first boss," I interrupt.

She raises an eyebrow and tilts her head.

"You did?"

"Yeah, I'll meet up with you later, we can discuss strategies and provisions," I state.

"Right…yes, I'll be in the inn, in case you need me," she says and starts moving away.

I stare at her, something about her strikes as achingly familiar; she turns around for a brief second and then raises her hand to her chin. And I have a feeling the thought goes both ways. I turn to the crowd and see as Billfray rejoins the group of people.

"Alright, split up guys," I order, "I want a group of people with the bulkiest armor stats and the highest defense on this side. Fast DPS on this other side. I need high agility builds here and then try to organize a group of high defense and high damage over there."

They all nod quickly, and willingly or not, they start dispersing into groups. Surprisingly, it doesn't take long to get them organized. One person or another stare at each other with a frown but ultimately realize we are all in the same boat. I don't expect all of them to work perfectly together, but I hope they all pull their weight. I quickly assign party leaders for each group and make a bit of a hierarchy command for better communication.

"Alright, I'll be back in a bit; need to ask if we are going to be given supplies or if we'll have to buy our own. Run some drills or something, just make sure your party can work together," I state.

The now assigned party leaders nod at me and I make my way to the inn. I walk in and find myself dropped into a heated argument between this girl Asuna and the representative from the Army.

"We can't do this, it's not right!" she says.

"What do you care, they are all red players," he answers.

"They are still human beings!"

"That's why you decided to stay, because you care so much, isn't it?" the man questions.

He finally notices my presence and walks away from the knight.

"No point in discussing this," he says and walks past me.

"Sorry for interrupting that lovely talk," I joke.

The girl sits down at the nearest table to her and sighs.

"Just ignore it…" she says.

"Either way, I would like to discuss a few things with you," I say.

"Yeah, take a seat."

I sit in front of the girl and bring my hands over the table. I hear the metal in my gauntlets clank all too noisily and spread my hands apart. I clear my throat and I'm about to speak when Asuna does so first.

"What kind of weapons are those?"

"Uh, It's a rare drop," I reply.

"Never seen anyone else with those," Asuna says, "They look pretty strong."

"Heh, they are as a matter of fact," I say with a smile.

She chuckles a bit and raises her eyes to my face, then just stares for a few seconds and I come to the conclusion that she is staring at the scars.

"So why do yo-"

"Have the scars?" I interrupt her.

"Yeah," she nods.

"I would be careful as to how you explain this to a stranger," Mirai mutters.

"I'm not sure…they appear when I put the gauntlets on," I lie and unequip the things off my arms.

She nods and proceeds to sigh yet again. By now I have a long list of things that strike me odd about her. Her attitude, her talk with the Army man and just whole aura I'm catching around her. I guess I need to start my questions somewhere.

"Why are you so calm?" I ask.

"Huh, what do you mean?"

"I've never seen a green player be so calm around red ones. I mean, even that jarhead was kind of anxious," I explain.

"Well in this case it's really easy," she says, "All of the players outside and you are all here for one reason. You all want to redeem yourselves. Whatever the reason you have for wanting to go back to a green cursor you are willing to risk your lives to do so. What I'm trying to say is…I don't think anyone outside or you for that matter is a bad person."

"If only she knew, huh?" Mirai comments.

"I see," I say, "Is that why you were arguing with that guy?"

"Well, kind of, yeah…" she admits, "The Army is doing a great deal of things I don't agree with, this is one of them, throwing you guys in there without any info, with such a cheap reward, it's inhuman. I'm not only your contact back to them, I would like to partake in the raid too."

"Wait, what?"

"That's why I joined the Knights, at least they respect human life, unlike The Army," she says, ignoring me, "That's why the Knights decided to stay out of this, and I'm just here out of my own will an-"

"Shut up for a second!" I demand.

She widens her eyes at my words and leans back a little. She is clearly irked by me telling her to shut it but I speak before she has any chance to.

"What do you mean without info?" I ask, "I thought you guy would have something for us to go on, didn't anyone do some recon?"

"I guess they also avoided saying that, huh?" she says sounding quite down.

"What is it?"

"You guys are the scouting party," Asuna says.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you all enjoyed this chapter!

**Update 12/10/2015: **This chapter now has DragonofAnnoth's revision! Thanks a bunch to him!

Anyways! Hello and welcome to the madhouse! Population Aeri! You know, according to what I've seen in my dysfunctional personality classes, schizophrenia and for that matter, personality disorder can present itself due to immense amounts of stress or traumatic experiences. Some of the things that present themselves while under both or any of these "illnesses" are vivid hallucinations. That and this excuse for me writing Aeri with an Alter Ego that ultimately makes her uneasy ends with the fact that the emotional imprint left on SAO allows me to pretty much make a really valid excuse for this to be happening to our lovely heroine. Also who is that chest-nut haired girl I spy with my eyes?! Is probably that character that gets completely undermined by the main protagonist of the show and gets literally reduced to a pair of tits? Yes it is and while that is harsh I get pretty mad at the fact that she is not given any proper character development until the small arc after death gun. Anyways be sure to criticize how I wrote her but I think it was appropriate consider how gentle she starts becoming after her first few run ins with Kirito. Besides she is always shown to have a soft spot for helping people.

**IC0: **I'm glad to hear everyone seems to be liking the extra chapters! Also keep your reviews coming! Haha it makes me want to write with more passion! **Devilparrot: **Hopefully this answers your question about clearer progress! **Steve the Man: **You guys remember how I once said I might be changing the story to an M-rating? Let's just say one of the drafts of the previous chapter involved some in-depth description Aeri's body along with a little more intense kissing scene from her part. But it ultimately didn't add anything to the story so it got scraped and we remain T-rated! **rfpaul: **Yeah, maybe she can find something to hold on to soon. **Smuglehorn: **Thank you so much for deeming my writing worthy of your time! These kind of reviews mean so much to me! They really make me happy, thank you! **Casquis: **This is the friend I told you about with the giant Halo story! He tells me this review was meant to be a heart but FF hates us so it's a "3". **Silvariux: **We'll see if your hunches on my story stay true! Glad to see you are back!

Lastly, OMG, I can't even begin to tell you guys how grateful I am to hear I have your support concerning my backlog writing! Holy shit I swear it almost brought a small tiny tear to my eyes, thank you so much everyone for understanding! BUT, do I have good news for you! (While I didn't exactly write a lot of chapters...) Chapter 46 is done! AND LET ME TELL ITS PROBABLY THE COOLEST THING I'VE WRITTEN IN A WHILE! Hopefully I can write at least two chapters this week, if I'm not able, I'll tell you next Sunday and thus we'll see how the story's update schedule goes! As always be sure to review if you like what you see or just want to say anything! I'll see you all next week! (Also there's a colored version of a new sketch on imgur CHECK IT OUT!)

Next Chapter: "Mass Redemption"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 3.- Alternate Routes**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

**Esra**

One can't help to wonder about choices. Through our lives we are presented with an astounding amount of them. We go on through the path we make, a path forged by the choices we take. But one can't help to wonder, could something be different if we had taken another route? Or would it be similar as how things are now?

I keep coming back to this place. I know I probably shouldn't; it's dangerous, but this is my favorite place in this world. It's calm and soothing, even more so with what has been happening. It feels like the perfect place to run away to, to hide, to block everything out. Soothing is the word, or at least I used to think so.

I finish cleaning the last of the chairs and look around our barren home. It's silent and dark, devoid of the sounds of laughter and conversations that used to fill it. My grip tightens on the top of the chair and I feel my eyes watering. Why is it that this place hurts so much now? It isn't fair.

"You have to stop coming here."

I turn my gaze to the entrance and see him, the leader and master of this house.

"I'm sorry," I mumble, "Someone…someone has to come by and clean, master."

He gives me a sympathetic look, once I see his worried smile I whimper a little at his sad smile. I close my eyes and feel as the few tears that managed to form in my eyes slip down my cheeks. He closes the door behind him and locks it.

"Esra, I know what this place means to you," he says, "but it's not safe to keep coming back, not for a while."

"It isn't fair, master," I whine.

"Esra…" he sighs.

"Why did they have to die?" I question, "Please tell me why!"

"We've talked about this," he says, turning away.

"I know you said not to think about it, but…" I sniffle, "What if there was another outcome? What if we could've done something? What if…it could've been avoided?"

"What if then, Esra?"

"Then maybe they would be alive! Maybe Daath would be alive, maybe we could be left alone," I yell.

"Do you think that would've stopped Klaus? Do you think he wouldn't go after us then?" He says.

"Right, I forgot this all happened because you had to win a pissing contest back at the beginning of this nightmare!"

His stare breaks off of me instantly and drops to the floor. His breath sounds ragged now, but he calms quickly.

"I'm…I'm sorry…I…" I mutter.

"No, you are right, you are right…" he mumbles.

"Master. No, I didn't mean to…"

"Then what else did you mean, Esra?" he asks, "You are right, it is my fault Daath is dead, it's my fault Kato is dead, it's my fault Regi is dead, and it also is my fault Owl is dead!"

"No, I didn't mean…"I start but he cuts me off again.

"No, you meant every word you said," he says calmly, "I understand we are all under a lot of stress, not to mention that everyone is scared. I'm so sorry I've brought such pain and sadness to your life."

I remain without a single word to say and just hold my arm with my hand.

"What if you hadn't met me?" he asks, "Since you are thinking so much about shit like that, it amazes you didn't propose that scenario first. You know, the one where I don't come into your life to fuck it over as badly as I did."

"Don't say that…please," I whimper.

"You know Esra, maybe, just maybe, you really are right," he says, "Maybe all of this is in fact my fault; there's a shit ton of things I regret. But I don't regret meeting you; I don't regret forming this guild, I don't regret getting us where we are today. Maybe I fucked up along the way but I don't regret having any of you in my life."

He turns around and heads for the door, he unlocks it and is halfway through before he stops.

"I really do understand, trust me," he says, "The way you are feeling right now, what this place means to you, the memories it evokes…but I don't want us to be in more danger. I know it might be hard for you but I need you to stop coming here."

"Yes, master," I say, nodding at him.

He nods as well and is about to leave yet again when I stop him.

"Al," I say.

He turns with a surprised expression, ever since he became master of this house, not once have I called him by his name. It feels appropriate at this point.

"I'm sorry," I say and bow at him.

An eternal silence stretches between us.

"It's ok, I don't think you would be the only one to blame me anyway…" he mumbles, "But congrats, you are the first to actually say it."

He leaves and closes the door on his exit, I'm wrapped in the sudden darkness of the house and breathe steadily for a few seconds. I bring down my menu and materialize a broom into my hand. I start to feel bad about the way I reacted; it was mean, unprofessional, and I hurt him. I hurt my master. I start sweeping around the table. By the time I'm halfway around the table I stop and stare at the wall for a few seconds.

"I don't deserve this uniform…" I huff and with my menu quickly unequip it, "Not until I earn it back again."

My uniform appears neatly folded on top of my hands and I leave it on top of the table. Feeling sad and idiotic I continue sweeping. After all I have to hurry up if I want to make it back by sundown.


	46. Chapter 46 - Mass Redemption

**Chapter 46.- Mass Redemption**

**November/6th/2023**

**Forty Eight Floor of Aincrad – Lindarth**

**Aeri**

"Provision check will be done in an hour, be ready!" Asuna calls.

"We don't take orders from you!" comes the shouted reply.

"Yeah, we don't care what a Knight of the Blood has to say!"

I try to approach Asuna, who is clearly clenching her fists and ready to blow her top at the other player's remarks. She practically leaps at the last player that spoke to her, but I manage to take a hold of her before she does anything rash.

"Hey, calm down, I got this," I mutter.

"I'll teach him to have a little respect!" she struggles in my arms.

"Hey, calm down, come on," I plead.

From the one day I've known Asuna I've realized a few things about her. She has a short fuse and is also probably the proudest person I've ever met. It helps that she is a kind soul, otherwise I wouldn't be calling her anything else than a bottle brunette with a bitchy attitude.

With her anger finally under her control she relaxes and carefully removes herself from my grip. Stomping like a child she heads back to the inn and throws the door open.

"Just be sure you are ready!" she demands.

"Aye, ma'am," I joke.

"Alright people," I huff as I turn around, "I want you to divide in the established groups like you should have done by now!"

The players scramble into their groups and I start pacing around waiting for them. Yesterday was rough, but it showed the resolve these guys had in them. After hearing about what the Army really had planned for us from Asuna our first decision was to tell everyone. The response was unexpected but it ultimately filled me with fire and the need to see this through. These red players didn't give a damn and now more than ever they are fueled by their need to prove the Army wrong. Asuna still encouraged everyone to think before accepting but they were angry for being played and their answer was not going to be easy to change. After all in the end everyone is here for the items the Army promised and even with just the excuse to piss the Army off the items themselves are enough incentive to keep everyone here.

"Your little puppies are growing up to be commendable mutts," Mirai huffs, fading into sight.

"Lovely, here I thought I was going to go a day without you," I mumble.

"What, no, I wouldn't leave you alone, it's too much fun watching screw up your own life," she replies.

Once everyone is ready the party leaders step forwards and set their sights on me. From between them Billfray nods at me. A surprising amount of respect towards someone who sucker punched him out of command, but I'll take it. I feel the urge to start an inspirational speech but I will keep my cool words for when we are at the boss' door.

"Last chance to back out," I say, "We are going in blind, hell knows why the Army hasn't bothered to check this boss out but they are sending us in first."

"Yeah, cause they are a bunch of pussies!" someone screams.

His surprisingly formal words prompt the rest of the raid party to yell and laugh raucously.

"Heh, I like that guy," Mirai mutters.

"Maybe so," I comment, "So now, once again and just like yesterday. I want to see hands up in the air. Who doesn't want in on this? Last chance to back out, no one will judge you."

No hands go up and I smile. I give it a few more seconds just in case someone truly has second thoughts. Five more seconds pass and no one chickens out on me. Great.

"Alright, be sure you are ready, buy anything you think will help you," I order, "We leave after provision check!"

"You know I find something quite funny," Mirai huffs, "These guys are merely listening to your orders and working together out of spite to the Army."

"So what?" I ask.

"I just wonder how well that glue will hold them together when shit hits the fan," she answers with a grin.

Sadly there is nothing but truth spilling out of her blurry mouth. Yesterday before Asuna and I came out with the truth they made co-operation quite tricky. I merely got a bit of an edge because I punched one of the toughest guys straight in the face. But it wasn't until we told them the truth that they decided to become a bit more docile with orders. They want to prove the Army wrong; they want to come out on top. It's great to see such things as a driving force in a moment like this. I just hope that when faced with danger that resolve stays the same.

I turn around and head to the inn, at least I get one last chance at trying to talk Asuna out of this. I get where she is coming from but there's no need for her to risk her life. I would like the help but, I don't want any innocent people dying, not today. I push the door and walk into a déjà vu kind of scenario. Asuna is having yet another heated argument with the Army jarhead, it feels achingly familiar to the one before.

"This is the last time I'm warning you," the man says, "I don't even have any obligation to do this I merely don't want an important clearer like you to go down in the fire."

"As I said last time," Asuna says and crosses her arms, "You can back to your dear Army and leave me here. I'm not letting these guys go alone! Your guild is truly despicable."

"I'm just trying to save yo-"

"Save me! I need no saving," she states, "The ones who need saving are you and your whole guild! Can't you see what you've drove these people to do?! They are jumping head first into danger because they want redemption! And yet, you treat them like animals, like something less than human! You make me sick."

"I want it to be known," the Army man pauses, "That I warned you, several times. Whatever happens falls on you and your own stupidity."

With those lovely parting words the Army man turns around and speeds off through the door.

"That almost sounded like a threat," I comment.

"It did, didn't it?" Asuna sighs, "What are we going to do?"

"We are going to beat that boss," I say.

She chuckles slightly and looks at me with a small smile.

"I'm glad you are that confident," she says.

"Well if I wasn't I would've ditched this thing yesterday."

"True…do you really think you can make it through?" she asks.

"Well, not really, but I'm gonna try, I'm gonna try real hard," I mutter, "And if things come crashing down, we can always escape the boss room."

"But then the deal would be off," she says.

"But then at least we tried," I reason.

"Hearing you trying to sound inspired and filled with hope is fucking disgusting," Mirai mumbles.

"Well, I guess we should be checking up on everyone soon," Asuna says.

"Calm down girl, we still have over half an hour," I say with chuckle, "Let's have some food, and maybe something to drink."

"Yeah, heh, I guess that can't hurt," she agrees.

* * *

**Forty Eight Floor of Aincrad – Twentieth Floor of The Seraph Labyrinth**

We stand in front of the massive door. By some miracle we managed to get through the entire dungeon of this damn thing without a single scratch. I'm surprised of how well we managed but somehow I can't shake this lingering feeling of death in the back of my head.

"Why is game design so fucking lazy?" Mirai asks, "I mean, the only way this thing can get more cliché is if you needed a big key with horns to open it."

"So what now?" I ask, turning my head to Asuna.

Trying to catch her breath she sheathes her rapier and sets her hands on her hips. She is trying to keep some composure but she clearly has yet to unwind from the last battle before this massive door.

"Well, the next logical step is to go in, but a break can't hurt," she suggests.

"Alright people, take ten!" I yell, "Make sure you have your potions and formations on order, we'll go in after this."

I hear collective sigh come from the modest little army before me and about half of the guys drop to the floor and start relaxing. Past our raid party I see about four of the Army's jarheads. They've been following us since we entered the labyrinth, I don't mind them following but I have a strong urge to send them packing. Not only do they send us into hell but they stick around to watch us burn.

"You're giving the Army soldiers the evil eye," Asuna whispers.

"What's wrong with our face?" Mirai comments.

"Oh, haha, sorry," I mumble, "I just don't like them…not like I liked them before but uh, just nevermind."

"I don't like them either, but you stare at them as if you want to kill them," she says.

"Dammit, she is on to us," Mirai says with a laugh.

"I'm just mad, I guess."

"Well, I can understand that," she says.

"Hey, Asuna…" I mutter.

"Yeah?"

"You can still back out, I wouldn't hold it to you," I say, "You don't need to risk your life with us."

"Nope, I'm going with and you'll just have to deal with that," she says.

"You are very stubborn, you know that?" I prod.

"And you are too," she says, "Now, we should get ready, we don't know what might be waiting on the other side of that door."

"How about bringing our mutts up to speed?" Miria suggests.

For once I find myself agreeing with her. I move myself to the front of the door and turn around. Some players are eating; some others are just lying on the floor. I clear my throat and clap my hands.

"Everyone listen up," I say.

Nobody turns around.

"Louder," Mirai teases.

"Hey! Listen up!" I scream.

This time everyone turns around and I smile confidently. When no one moves, an angry look corrects their folly and slowly the players assemble into their designated parties.

"Hehe, let's get started, shall we?" Mirai mutters and slowly disappears from sight.

"In few second, we'll be going in there!" I say as I indicate the door behind me, "We don't know what's behind this damn door but right now it's too late to turn back. However! Let's allow one more chance for anyone that wants to run away to do so now! But consider the following, when we've made it this far will running away look like anything else other than pathetic?!"

The mood settles in nicely as I see a few frowns and expressions that plain simply just read angry. Let's turn that anger into fuel that will not let our flame waver in the slightest. I want to see pure black rage which we will concentrate on this damn boss.

"Running away will only make you look worse than the Army! They are sending us in because they are too afraid to do things by themselves! They are too scared to face whatever is behind this door!" I stop for a second to catch my breath, "But we'll show them, we'll show this so called 'Army' of Aincrad that they are merely cannon fodder when compared to us!"

"Yeah!" they yell together.

I see the leaders of are getting particularly riled. That's it; more fuel. I turn to look at Asuna, and she shoots me a worried glance. My words might not be the best to rile up someone like her but I'm getting the job done with the others. So let's keep it going.

"Red players! We are looked down upon! Frowned upon! But our actions brought us here, they bind us together! Under one color!" I yell and raise my right hand above my head, "We share a cursor and once we go through that door we will share one fate! We all seek redemption, and we are going to get it! We are nothing to be looked down on, we are strong, and if we work together I believe we can be stronger than even the clearing parties!"

Once again they all yell together, their voices echo loudly in the labyrinth and my hands start to shake a little. Players with shields start bashing their weapons against their shields and the ones without start stomping the ground. With their spears, with their feet, a symphony for war slowly starts taking form and I can't help but to grin widely.

"Sure they've been clearing floors but they lack something we have, something they were stupid enough to give us!" I yell and equip Cain and Able in my arms, "We have a reason to see this through without backing down! Where they run away to regroup and plan another attack we shall charge forwards and kill whatever is inside that room!"

I pause once again and raise my arms to quiet down the crowd. As I lower my arms the roars of battle go down in volume and quantity.

"So I have one last thing to ask you," I say, "Are you ready?!"

I turn around and face the door as I hear the raid party going wild. The shield bashing and the floor stomping grows louder than my own thoughts in a matter of seconds. Asuna approaches me from the side and draws her rapier. With a few interactions through her menu she sends me a party invite and I accept it with a smile.

"I guess I would've chosen another set of words, but that sure got them fired up," she says.

"Come on, I can't help feeling your words would've only varied slightly," I say and chuckle slightly as I see her name appear below mine.

A party of two, it'll making switching in an out easy, but it will also leave us exposed and kind of vulnerable if we decided to draw the Boss with agro. She is strong, I can feel it and seeing her fight up this labyrinth only confirmed it. We'll work together.

I place both of my hands on the massive door and start pushing, it creaks loudly and ominously.

"They are sending us into hell!" I yell, "But we are going even deeper! Form up once the doors are open! I want to see the DPS gorup behind me, we'll get the first strike!"

I turn my gaze one last time to Asuna, my words might've not synced up completely with her but I can see the determination right in her eyes.

"I hope you can keep up," I say.

"Heh, if I get first hit you'll buy me dinner," she says with a smug smile.

"Then I hope you have a lot of col because I'll be having something expensive to eat," I say and push the doors open with all my strength.

I start running right away into the dark room. Torches slowly start to light up but I'm running faster into the room than they light. At the corner of my eye I can see Asuna giving chase. She seems to be catching up to me. In thick darkness ahead of us I see a set of red eyes slowly turning their gaze towards us. Around eight health bars appear enveloping a still shadowed figure ahead. Next to them a name slowly appears. Urgrik the Reaper stands before us.

The room narrows towards the end and torches finally light up the boss. A massive centaur with multiple arms holds a single giant scythe. It roars in our direction and I can smell the stench of his breath from a more than a few feet away.

"You know what Asuna," I say, "Scratch what I said, you are cooking for me!"

"What? We are not even there yet!" she yells.

With that I feel both of my hands vibrate and the whirring sound of a skill presents itself. I jump towards the wall and kick myself off of it. I put my hands in front of me and spin a bit before opening my hand into a claw. I embed myself into the chest of Urgrik and finish my skill by pulling out my hand off his thick, hardened skin. Once I do the background music kicks in with a melodic chorus of women followed by a completely contrasting drum solo that unwinds into the most intense battle theme I've heard in this game so far. Before jumping down I look down at Asuna and smile, she frowns at me but ultimately smiles back.

"Switch!" I yell.

As I fall down she jumps to me with her arm extended. I grab her arm and with all my strength swing her up as I fall down. She flies through the air and rams her sword in between Urgrik's eyes. She yanks it out and as she goes down unleashes a barrage of stabs and swipes unto his body. Urgrik shouts something in a nonsensical language and with one of his extra arms slaps at Asuna as she makes her descent. With inhuman prowess she manages to stab her blade on his hand and holds on until the end of his swing. At the apex of Urgrik's slap Asuna jumps again and twirls in the air with her sword shining an intense gold light. I can hear her scream as she falls right back down sword first into Urgrik's horse half. Finally I turn my gaze behind me and I see the DPS party arriving. Screaming their lungs out they start attacking Urgrik. Behind them two other parties wait as the two parties at the back start fighting off the minions that spawned with the boss battle initiated. A bit reminiscing of the Kobolds we fought in the first boss battle but these are faster, uglier and most of them hold two weapons.

"Remember to switch out for healing!" I yell and prepare another skill.

We've barely given Urgrik a chance to retaliate; our attack is relentless and strong. We've been staggering the bastard, giving him no chance of attacking for almost half a bar of health. This is too easy.

"Almost too easy," I hear in the back of my head.

A shiver shoots through me and I struggle to concentrate for a second. I run towards the party of bulky players in front of me and jump on the shoulders on the one with the biggest armor. I jump once again and with my gauntlets hang from Urgrik's right front leg. I climb slowly but making sure I damage the beast with every time I pull myself up. In a few seconds of climbing I find Asuna, she punishes Urgrik's human half from behind. The massive monster growls and bellows as it tries hard to stop staggering.

"Finally," she says, "switch!"

Aided by the game I place myself quickly next to her and with my right arm shining I start punching at Urgrik's spine. I punch with all my strength only to swing my right hand back and drive it with even more strength back into the thing's spine. A satisfying crunch is heard every time I punch accompanied by a shiver that goes all the way up my arm. I jump back a bit and pull my left hand back towards Asuna.

"Switch!" I exclaim and take hold of her free arm.

I lock my footing and with my throw skill I swing her at Urgrik's back. Admittedly I didn't give her much time to prepare but she manages to trigger a skill before her rapier makes contact with Urgrik's skin. She lets go of her sword and falls on her back. I help her up quickly and see that her sword is driven all the way through to the pommel on Urgrik's spine.

"Haha, holy shit," I mutter.

"A bit of a heads up would be better for next time!" she yells.

"Hey it worke-" I say but stop myself.

I see the centaur's extra arms twist in an abnormal fashion. They seem to break as they do a complete one eighty turn on Urgrik's torso. The hands turn into fists and aim for us.

"I don't care if it worked, you should've to-" I interrupt Asuna as I tackle her.

We both fall down on Urgrik's soft horse back and Asuna quickly hugs me only to roll to us a little to the side, barely avoiding another attack. We slide over his shoulder and I hold on to Asuna with my left hand as I stab my right hand on the beast's skin. We dangle from Urgrik's left shoulder, his human half repositions it's arms and finally neglecting all the damage being done to him he swings at the parties below with his scythe. With ease he does a clean swipe at his feet and sends several players flying into the air. Some smash against the wall and other just slam against the floor. Surprisingly they get up quickly and down health potions to continue the attack.

"I think it's time to help with the minions," I suggest.

"I need my sword," Asuna replies.

"Forget it, I'll lend you one," I say and let go.

We fall to the ground, still embracing each other and help each other to get up on our feet. She frowns at me and shakes her head with a sigh.

"Give it to me then," she says and starts running towards the back of the room.

I catch up to her and avoiding players as I run I go through my items. I spot a rather heavy broadsword and sigh to myself. It'll have to do.

I materialize it in my hand and throw it over to Asuna.

"Catch," I say.

Without even turning her head around she only opens her hand and takes hold of the handle. Taken by surprise she staggers back a little but then easily lifts the massive sword to rest it over her shoulder.

"Really?!" she yells at me with a disapproving frown.

I shrug and match up to her speed. We approach a group that seems to be having trouble with three minions and we both lock eyes briefly.

"You go in first," she demands.

I nod and raise my hand to look at my glowing fingertips. I put my hand in front of me and place my left hand over my right shoulder.

"Stand aside!" I yell.

The players quickly step away and I manage to get a straight line to the three minions. I drive my hand through the first and adjust slightly to the side. My hand goes through the second one and in a crazy attempt to get the three of them I swing my body to the left. By some miracle I manage to the go through the three of them, making a neat minion-kebab with my arm. I pull my hand out and roll backwards as I see the shadow of Asuna jumping into the air.

"Switch!" I shout.

Asuna swings the massive sword vertically and manages to get all three of the minions in one hit. The sword's mass along with Asuna's strength manage to easily cut down the three bastards and make a neat crater in the ground. All in one swing.

"Aw, hell yeah!" a girl in the group we aided screams.

"That's one way to do it!" her companion yells, "Nice going, knight!"

Asuna places the blade back over her shoulder and stares at me with a very satisfied grin. I see a lot of myself in this girl but at the same time I think we are complete opposites. I smile as well and turn around to take a quick look at the boss.

To my dismay I turn just in time to see him create the first casualties of the battle. A few limp avatars are thrown against a nearby wall and shatter into tiny polygons. The reality of the situation finally weighs on me.

"No!" Asuna bellows and makes a mad dash towards the boss.

I take hold of her arm, stopping her. She pulls me along a bit but stops struggling after a few feet.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

"Don't charge at it just like that," I huff and pull her behind me, "We go in together."

She nods but her expression seems to be riddled with fury.

"Then let's go!" she yells.

"Everyone hang back towards the exit!" I yell as I start running with Asuna, "No point in fighting in the narrow area of the room!"

The players I run past I see them nod and they start retreating a bit to the exit. The ones that need more warning are the parties attacking Urgrik. Asuna is the first to reach the frontline and starts telling players to back away a bit. I don't know if due to the pressure or Asuna's tone alone they heed her orders and start backing out. Looking at Urgrik I see that we've already depleted two of his health bars and we are halfway through the third.

"Hang back!" I order as we give ourselves a bit of a breather from the massive centaur.

Urgrik starts laughing and slowly starts approaching us. He rears up on his hind legs and fiercely stomps the ground. A large shockwave knocks us to the ground. Asuna helps me up and we start helping other players on their feet. Urgrik keeps moving forward and places a pair of his hands on his weapon and the length suddenly doubles.

"No fucking way," I hear a player mutter.

"Billfray!" I yell, "Start getting people back to the door!"

I see him standing amidst a crowd of fallen players and he starts helping people up. He pushes them behind him and starts yelling for everyone to go to the door. People have only just gotten out of the way, and Asuna and I barely manage to avoid Urgrik's first swing.

"Are we retreating?" Asuna asks.

"I don't know, but we need to get some distance!" I answer.

In a hurried attempt to distance ourselves from the boss we find a more worrying situation. As we all haul ass to the room's door a couple of Army jarheads go inside and start closing the door. Four guys, two on each door struggle to close the door as we make our approach.

"What the hell are they doing?! " I yell and start speeding up past the raid party.

Pushing and nudging a few people around I position myself in front of everyone and reach the door as it closes right in our faces. I slam my fists against the now closed door, with no handles or any means to open it I turn around to see Urgrik laugh as he keeps approaching us.

"Was that the Army?!"

"I knew it, this is all a trap! They sent us here to die!"

"Those bastards!"

Asuna emerges from the angry sea of players and just as she is about to reach me she is pushed into the ground by another player.

"You knew about this didn't you?!" A player with a spear asks.

I grab Asuna from the ground and pull her back with me. I place myself in-front of her and guard her with my own body.

"Kill the Knight of the Blood!" someone screams.

"Are you idiots crazy?" I scream, "This is not the time!"

"Yeah! There's a boss in this room dumbasses!" Billfray screams from the crowd.

I briefly look him in the eye and we both nod at each other.

"We'll decide what to do with the knight later," Billfray exclaims, "but we need to concentrate on this ugly bastard first!"

He raises his sword towards Urgrik and then completely turns around giving me his back. Most players do as well and about thirty players immediately brandish their weapons towards the boss.

"It's kill or be killed!" Billfray screams and charges towards the centaur.

Thankfully all of the remaining players follow him into the battle, leaving me and Asuna behind. I turn around a bit enraged.

"Please tell me you have nothing to do with this," I say.

She shakes her head and a worried look crosses her face.

"I had no idea, I swear," she says softly.

"We were having such a good time!" Mirai complains, "There's no need to change the mood! Come on, get mad! Let's go and kill that thing!"

"Alright then," I say and grab her hand, "we are getting on top of that thing."

I start dragging her along with me and we both manage an even pace as we run towards the attacking players and Urgrik himself.

Mixing things up a little he swings occasionally with his scythe but seems to be constantly using his fists to smash the ground in front of him. We are dealing damage but at the same time he is decimating our attack force. Only three health bars to go. Comparing this to what little I remember from the first boss we seem to be doing a lot of damage. But this is merely because we are not being as careful as with the first boss. Parties are barely switching we are but a furious mob of people that is constantly attacking the boss.

"Alright, I can finally ditch this thing!" Asuna says and drops the sword I gave her.

"Billfray!" I yell

"What?" he says as he turns around to see me.

"Sorry about this," I say and jump on top of him to boost myself.

"Sorry," Asuna echoes as she does the same.

With one jump we manage to make it to the place we were fighting before coming down to help. Asuna's rapier is still stuck where she left it. Not wasting a second she hurries to retrieve her blade. Surprisingly the thing comes away with one tug and we both are ready to begin attacking again.

"Keep attacking; we are almost there!" I hear Billfray scream.

His sudden change in attitude is most welcome and he seems to be handling the attacking party quite well.

"Ready!" Asuna says.

"Alright then!" I huff.

"Heh, finally!" Mirai screams with joy.

I run towards Urgrik's back and jump, ready to attack. One of his arms quickly snaps back and readies itself to attack. He is getting faster. I manage to kick it, changing my trajectory just slightly to avoid it. I end up attacking one of his arms that is yet to turn on me.

"Shit! Asuna, switch!"

She charges in and instead of jumping starts running up his back with amazing speed. She stabs her rapier as she runs and drags it along with her all the way to Urgrik's head. The centaur screams and with a heaving breath throws himself on the ground. He doesn't do this by accident; he consciously throws himself on the floor squishing about half of our fighting force in the process. I fall on the ground and roll to recover myself. As it he lifts himself off the ground not even half of the people he crushed remain alive. He laughs manically and once again grabs his scythe with multiple arms. This time he splits it evenly by the middle. He now holds two scythes with thinner blades. As soon as he is able he starts slashing at the remaining attack force. Only two bars to go. I see Asuna touch down on the other side of the room and I look down at my hands.

"Come on, it's time to use it!" Mirai screams, "Come on!"

I take out a big potion and quickly drink it all. My health, by the grace of whatever god oversees bloody melees, is unscathed but I will need the healing for the following.

"Do it! Do it!" she keeps screaming.

I bring both hands up to my neck and dig my spiky fingers into my neck for a brief second.

"Bloodlust…" I mumble.

Cain and Able start vibrating and their reach on my arms extends all the way to my shoulders. My whole body starts burning and my health starts decreasing. Thankfully the potion helps a little and the speed at which it goes down is rather slow.

"Now kill that fucking thing!" Mirai bellows.

I run towards its hind legs and jump at them. I close my hands over his flesh, squeezing tightly. With all the strength I can muster I start ripping chucks out of his leg. The damage effect is left behind and I continue to destroy his leg. I keep going for a few seconds and then switch to a front leg. Urgrik is limping but he is trying his best to keep killing players.

"Aeri!" Asuna yells from the other side of the boss.

I just start laughing as I continue shredding the bastard's leg. Once I'm done with the one on the front he bends the knee. I've rendered him immobile.

"Everyone get back!" I yell and jump to place myself in front of the centaur, "Attack when I say!"

Urgrik bellows in agony but still musters enough strength to grab me with one of his free hands. I start clawing away and pulling chunks out of his own hand as he holds me. At one point I find myself biting his finger as he tries to squeeze me.

"Let me go!" I yell and slam both of my hands over his fingers.

He lets go and I fall to the ground. The damage I've done becomes evident as he's only got four fingers on the hand he chose to grab me with.

"Get ready!" I yell, looking back a little.

Every single red player remaining is anxiously waiting for my cue but Asuna is staring at me with a scared expression.

"Bring it on you bastard!" I yell as Mirai's voice eerily echoes in my ear.

He swings his scythes from both sides like a pair scissors that quickly closes its blades on me. I spread my arms apart and hold both blades as they close on me. The force being inflicted on my arms almost hurts, as if they were about to break but I hold on and clench my fists on the scythes blade. Incapacitated and with me holding both of his weapons he is completely open for an attack.

"Kill him!" I yell as I struggle to look past the pressure being inflicted in my arms, "Kill him now!"

I hear about a dozen players screaming behind me and then see them jump and run past me to attack the centaur. My health reaches twenty five percent and I adjust my grip on his weapons.

"Hang in there!" Asuna screams as she runs past me to attack Urgrik.

His remaining health starts dropping at a satisfying rate. With only one set of arms left to attack the players he struggles to keep up with the stagger we are inflicting on him. Just one more bar. I smile as I see it reach fifty percent in a matter of seconds. I take a look at my own health and see myself reach the ten percent mark. I close my eyes and concentrate on holding the blades in place. Just a little longer, come on. The pressure on my arms suddenly disappears and I deactivate Bloodlust. The skill enters its five days cool down period and I kneel on the floor with only four percent of health remaining. I open my eyes and see a set of floating letters where the boss once stood.

"Congratulations!"

I smile and stand up slowly. What remains of the red players cheer and hug each other, ignoring the fact that a day ago they didn't care for what happened to one another.

"We did it! We really did it!"

"Yeah! We killed that thing! We cleared a floor!"

Asuna hurries towards me and forcefully puts a potion in my hands.

"What were you thinking?!" she asks, "What kind of skill drains your health?"

"The one I used," I answer with a chuckle.

"Good grief," she sighs, "Drink that now!"

I humor her and uncap the vial. As I drink the potion I feel this overwhelming sense of satisfaction. We did it, we really did it. I take a moment to look at what's left of us and that satisfaction I feel quickly finds itself tainted. Ten people plus Asuna and I, that's all that's left. Billfray approaches us as the cheers die down.

"You might want to get your knight friend away from these guys," he says.

I place my hand on Asuna's shoulder and put her behind me. The remaining players approach us with ill intent.

"What about our items, Knight?!" One yells.

"Forget the items, I want some payback!" Another states.

"Simmer down!" I shout as I start walking back with Asuna, "She had nothing to do with this, she didn't know. They tricked her like they tricked us!"

"Yeah, right!" a player with a spear says sarcastically.

A loud creaking sound overpowers the mob's angry complaints and we all turn our attention as the doors we come through start opening slowly. Four players from the Army come in their jaws drop in awe as they stare at the cleared boss room.

"Damn, you guys really did it," the one that has lovely talks with Asuna says.

As he approaches us he tosses a bag over to Asuna. She barely catches the thing and digs her hand inside. She takes out a scroll and stares at it.

"There's more of these inside," she says, "It's the items they promised."

I snatch the bag away from her and throw it over to Billfray.

"Hand them out to the survivors and leave the room," I order, "I'll handle this."

"But, they want answers…." Billfray insists.

"Get them out of the room!" I push.

"Fine by me!" A player screams and head to the door leading to floor forty nine.

"You heard her!" Billfray says, "Grab one of these and get out!"

"You have a lot to explain!" Asuna says.

"I do, don't I?" the jarhead mutters as his three friends join him.

I run towards him and grab him by the neck. I slam him on the ground and swipe at his friend's legs with my own, sending them tumbling. I tighten my grip on his neck, even as they hit the ground.

"You do, and you better start explaining before I kill you," I seethe.

"Aeri, what are you doing?" Asuna says, surprised.

"Answer me!" I yell and start digging my fingers into the man's neck.

"Fine! Hang on!" he struggles, "The Army didn't want to do a scouting battle on this floor until a week from now!"

"What?" Asuna questions.

"The clearing parties wanted a bit of a break…so I came up with a plan," he says, "I wanted to take red players, offering them items, in return of doing the scouting battle. The Knights of the Blood said no…and so did the Army!"

"That's why…" Asuna ponders, "No wonder no one from my guild helped me out…they thought the Army wasn't going to do this."

"Technically they didn't…" the man says.

"You guys did this on your own…that why Argo said this felt sketchy!" I say and slam the man's head on the ground, letting go of him.

The other Army players are already on their feet and they nervously draw their sword at me. I stand back and look around nervously. The rest of the players have left and only left me and Asuna behind.

"Kill them," Mirai comments, "Kill the fucking jarheads."

I dig into my pouch and take out knives with paralyzer. I throw them at the Army players and take a step back.

"This was all a damn trap from the beginning," I mutter.

"Kill them!" she insists.

"Aeri, I swear didn't know any of this," Asuna says.

"I believe you…" I mumble, "Let me say one thing though…"

Asuna swallows her own spit and finally sheathes her sword.

"Yeah?" she asks.

"If you don't make sure these guys go to prison," I say, "I will find them….and I will kill them."

Asuna's eyes stare at me with shock and her lips tremble. I take a step back and head for the door at the other side of the room.

"I mean it…" I huff and run towards the exit.

"Why not do it right now?" Mirai questions as I go through the open doors.

I start going up the stairs and temperature starts dropping, random snowflakes start hitting my face. Atop of the stairs lies another door which I promptly exit and trip because of my lack of cautiousness. I fall head first into the snow and stay there for a bit. It's nice and cold, sort of refreshing, I don't mind it one bit.

"Well that's one way to make it into floor forty nine," I hear Billfray teasing me.

"Shut up idiot…" I mumble and get on my feet.

"Alright, I believe this is yours," he says and approaches me with a scroll, "there were only nine of these things in the bag."

"What, for real?"

He nods and places what I assume to be the last scroll in my hand. I look above his head and see a green cursor. Argo was right, the item is real but they surely didn't have enough to begin with.

"Some of the survivors went out in such a hurry, they didn't even bother to ask me for theirs so that makes the last one rightfully yours," he says.

"What's with the sudden change of attitude?" I ask.

"Hey, I would think being nice to the person that saved your life should just be logical," he says, "Thanks for risking your ass back there, you really saved us all."

I smile a bit and a sudden notification pops in front of my face. A friend request from Asuna. With a chuckle I accept it quickly to discard the floating notification.

"Oh, also…" Billfray mutters, "This is yours."

A scythe materializes on his hands and he presents it to me.

"I got last hit, but I think you should have it," he says.

I refuse and push the weapon close to him.

"You keep it."

"Alright then," he says and stores the thing in his inventory, "Maybe we can meet some other time, under different circumstances."

"Heh, maybe," I reply.

I see him walk away and head towards the nearest settlement on the newly discovered floor. Snow as far as the eye can see, but it's a nice view. I wonder if the others would mind visiting this floor for a little bit. I breathe in the cold air and smile. I bring up the scroll to my face and activate it.

"Revert Player Cursor to green?"

I press the circle button under the question and I'm startled by a buzzing sound.

"This item cannot be used by player killers."

I laugh for a second and rip the tiny paper into shreds.

"Figures…" I mutter.

* * *

Crysina here!

Thanks to DragonofAnnoth for beta-reading!

I deeply apologize for having Aeri pull out something out of her ass to kill a boss. BUT it's not like someone did something like that on the source material, right? RIGHT? *coughkiritocough* I kid but I do kind of consider it a bit lazy but then again it helped drive the plot forwards so who cares. Also for those with questions and stuff, items to revert player status do exist and also there happens to exist a quest to do the same. However, player killing does make the orange cursor permanent. I had fun writing this chapter and I wrote it while listening to RWBY's "This Will Be The Day" Magical Girl Remix on repeat for over 4 hours. Let me tell it has probably been the hypest thing I've done all month thanks to that song. Sadly I now hate the song but my god was it god send for writing the action part of the chapter. I mean come on, on what language does "WE ARE LIGHTNING, STRAYING FROM THE THUNDER, MIRACLES OF ANCIENT WONDER" not sound cool? I dare you to find it. Either way fun chapter, filled my action quota for a while and I think it's pretty solid, actually a bit beyond solid. I'm proud of this one.

**Silvariux: **Mirai sure is fun to right I'll tell you that. It's like constantly thinking of ways to irritate Aeri. I find twisted fun in the and their back and forth tends to be quite entertaining. Hope this chapter satisfies your fighting needs. **IC0: **I'm glad I'm not the only one that pictures Esra as British-sounding. I like to think I did right by writing Asuna how I did, but you tell me, I thought I gave her a big enough spotlight. **Steve the man:** Damn, you really reached out into a part of the character I didn't even think I showed that much to be honest. That's freaking amazing. Al is tough though don't worry.

Let's quickly get this out of the way. The next chapter is not done yet. BUT, I will have it ready for next Sunday so don't worry you guys. B U T, I will be taking a week break after after chapter 47. For you see, I would really like not to rush future chapters, I wouldn't say this chapter and 47 for that matter are rushed but I just think that for future chapters I should take a small break to write ahead, you know? I hope you guys understand, after all it will only be a small break and it won't be happening until next week. Either way, as always, please leave a review if you like what you see or want to say something about my awful writing. I'll see you all, next week!

Next Chapter: "No Living Without Purpose"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 4.- Fire**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Thickwoods – Sylvie Inn**

**Siren**

We've been doing nothing for too long. Actually not even a week has passed but time has slowed down to an annoying rate. Hiding, waiting, wasting time, whatever, we've just been idling. I'm not the most proactive of people, in fact I dare say I'm the opposite the less I do in this damn place the less I have to worry about. But somehow it's been getting to me, maybe it's the atmosphere of it all, the people I'm surrounded with feel defeated, they no longer yearn anything. It's…sad. I joined these people because they looked as if they had a driving force, and they did but it's now gone. What happened? I guess it's dumb to ask, I know what happened but can a flame so intense be so easily extinguished?

"I'm bored…" Ruri mumbles.

"Well let's play a game or something," Elina proposes.

"If I play checkers one more time I swear I'm going insane," Ruri replies.

"Same here," Kayla mutters.

"Has anyone checked on the small girl?" Esra questions.

"I did, she doesn't seem to want to leave bed yet…" Elina explains, "I hope Aeri gets back soon."

Kayla bolts up from here resting position on the floor and opens her menu. She makes her way to the friends tab where she quickly selects Aeri's name.

"Holy crap, check it out!" she yells, "Look where Aeri is at!"

We all open our menus and scroll to Aeri's name and click it for more information.

**Lv. 61 Aeri**

**Guild Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds**

**Location Floor 49 - Myujen**

Heh, so that's what my favorite red head has been doing? I can't help but to smile as I see everyone in the room stare with awe into their menus.

"What is she doing there?" Elina asks.

"Did she help clear the floor?" Kayla ponders.

"That is so awesome!" Ruri says, "I wonder what that floor is like!"

"So she did it, huh?" a deep voice mutters.

We all turn to the entrance of the room and see Alshep. He looks happy, happier than I've seen him in the past few days. He quickly gets close to me and starts looking at Aeri's information through my menu. I can't help but to start blushing and break out in a cold sweat having him this close. Mustering all the power I have in my fragile body I stand still as he checks out my menu. He laughs soundly and claps his hand together. He seems…fired up.

"She freaking did it!" he says.

"Wait, you knew about this?!" Ruri asks.

"Yeah, but nevermind that, she freaking did it!" he says, "Guys we are throwing a party!"

"I will be sure to ready a feast master!" Esra says.

"That is my job though," Slyvianna says as she enters the room, "All of you relax, I'll be sure to come up with something nice."

"No!" Esra insists with a harsh tone.

I dismiss my menu and stare at the unusual but highly satisfying turn of events. Our maid rising up to the cause in what I can only assume will become a battle of pride. She told me about a problem she had with Alshep and that it was the reason why she stopped wearing her uniform. But now this is surely the way she wants to earn it back.

"Are you challenging me, maid?" Sylvianna snaps back.

"I am. Elf!" she growls.

The mood in the room turns electric as Esra and Slyvianna stare each other in the eye with no signs of backing down.

"It's been ages since something like this presented itself," Sylvianna mutters.

"Oh, has it been that long since someone beat you?" Esra mocks.

"Ohhh!" Ruri exclaims, adding more fuel to the already heated moment.

"Shut up, Ruri!" Esra yells.

"I can't have any fun anymore…" Ruri pouts and leans over Kayla.

Kayla embraces her, they both seem to be smiling, as well something I haven't really seen a bit. Is it really happening? Just as I was complaining in my head…it seems very convenient but I'm not about to complain. Is today the day, the day we get that fire back?

"Aereth! Aereth!" someone bellows from the girl's corridor.

The little girl, Sinna, comes out running into the common area. She looks around frantically and then runs over to Alshep. She jumps in front of him and stands on her tiptoes.

"Mr. Leader! Where is Aereth?!" she questions.

From the yard past the sliding doors Aereth jumps down from the roof and nervously seeks out Sinna.

"Something wrong? Are you ok?" He asks as he approaches the girl.

Sinna jumps into his arms and start hugging him with all her strength.

"She is alive, she cleared the floor!" Sinna says.

"What?" Aereth replies.

"She sent me a message, look, look!" Sinna says and opens her menu to show him.

Aereth takes a second to read the message Aeri sent to Sinna and the immediately presses his palm against his forehead.

"What the fuck was she thinking?" he says.

"Hey! Language!" Sinna scolds.

"Shit I'm sorry," he says, "Fuck, I mean…never mind…sorry."

"Heh, I guess it's gonna get a bit lively," I mutter.

"Yeah, it's been a while, huh?" Twyla says as she approaches me.

Edelwiess stomps around the yard with glee and rolls on its back as it growls. I guess it really is happening. I'm glad, I knew it was just a matter of time before we got out of this rut. I can see it in Alshep's eyes, he's done moping around. The question now is, where will he take us? Where will we go? What will we do? I stand up and pat down my pants as we all gather in the common area. I feel reassured for some reason, I guess I've been waiting for this but…I didn't want to do anything myself to help I just sort of expected…hoped it would happen.

"Hey…leader," I stammer.

"Yeah?" He asks with a smile.

"What are we going to do…" I pause, "you know…when Aeri gets back?"

He crosses his arms and shoots me an ear to ear grin.

"Let's just say we'll have some things to talk about."


	47. Chapter 47 - No Living Without Purpose

**Chapter 47.- No Living Without Purpose**

**November/7th/2023**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Sylvie Inn**

**Aeri**

"You sure took an awfully long time getting back here," Mirai says.

"I needed a break…" I mumble.

Reaching the steps outside the inn I sit down and rest my elbows on my knees. I sigh deeply and cover my face with my hands.

"From Sinna? Al? Elina? From the people that love you so much?" she ponders, "That's kind of mean, don't you think?"

Boiling up I turn around to the blurry shadow that is Mirai and bare my teeth at her. She shoots me a smug grin and crosses her arms.

"Did I poke a nerve?" she says, pouting mockingly, "Relax now, you don't want to scream at your imaginary friend now do you?"

I clear my throat and swing my arm at Mirai. She simply laughs and in the blink of an eye sets herself in front of me. I ignore her once more and stand up. I open the doors leading inside the seemingly torn down inn. The first thing I see is Sylvianna lazily reading a book, she rests her head on her own hand as she slowly flips page after page. I guess skimming its contents would be more appropriate. As the doors close behind me she looks at the entrance quickly and comes out from behind the counter.

"You are finally back!" she says.

"Yeah…were you waiting for me?" I ask.

"We all were, now excuse me I have a bit of a contest to attend to," she says and turns to head down the hallway. "I hope you are ready to lose, maid!"

"Wait…what?" I mumble.

I hear a drawn out sigh behind me and turn on my heels as I raise my hands. A player dressed completely in black stands in front of me. He has short black hair and a tired face, not to mention a heavy tint of sorrow in his eyes.

"Huh…" he mutters, "Hello."

"…Hi," I reply.

I stare at the small space above his head but can't see his cursor. SAO tends to hide cursors indoors where a lot of players can gather as to avoid the cluttering of your sight. I feel uneasy next to this guy and he seems…familiar.

"You are…" I mumble and then come to the realization.

"The beater," Mirai says with a grin, "Remember this guy? The one man who beat Daath, well if you don't count Klaus that is."

"Kirito," he mutters and extends his hand to me.

"Aeri…" I mumble as I awkwardly shake his hand.

He equips that familiar blue yukata and proceeds to go further into the inn. He's been here before; he already has that annoying garb Sylvianna forces us to wear. I equip the robe myself and give chase to this Kirito individual. We are both about to turn into the common area when Sylvianna pops out from around the corner.

"Kirito…sir…" she says, sounding surprised, "I didn't expect you at all."

"Yeah, sorry Sylvianna, I just need to be away from people." Kirito says softly.

Sylvianna looks behind her for a second, probably into the crowded common area.

"The inn isn't exactly…empty," Sylvianna replies.

"Oh, well, it's alright I guess," he mutters.

"At any rate, welcome, we'll be having a cook-off," Sylvianna says, "You are more than welcome to join us for food."

"The Elf is running her mouth," Mirai seethes.

"I don't want to be an inconvenience…" Kirito mutters

"You never are, Kirito, sir!" Sylvianna says and with an exaggerated gesture moves out of the way. "Now come in and have fun while wipe the floor with that maid!"

Kirito steps into the common area with a less than happy expression and is suddenly hugged by Sinna.

"Aeri, you are finally back!" she says before looking up and frowning, "You are not Aeri."

"I am not," Kirito huffs and softly removes Sinna from him.

Sinna finds her way to me just a few steps behind him. I get on my knees and hug her with all my strength.

"I missed you so much," I whisper in her ear.

"Did you really?" Mirai says.

"The maid lady and the one with the pointy ears are going to cook for us." She says with excitement.

"I heard," I say with a chuckle.

"So you are back," Aereth says as he approaches from the side. "You are one crazy girl, you know that right?"

I scratch my head and let out a soft laugh.

"I guess I am, huh?" I reply.

"Either way, is he a friend of yours?" He asks.

"No...although-"

"You...you are that beater, aren't you?" Al's voice cuts through from across the room.

Kirito stops halfway to the boy's corridor and turns around slowly. He refuses to raise his sight of the ground as he faces Al.

"I don't want any trouble," the black-clad player says.

"I...well, I didn't mean it like that, I just recognized you," Al shrugs.

"Yeah I did too...you are Date-" he stops and shakes his head, "Daath's friends right? We saw each other after the clearing of the first floor."

"Wait, you knew Daath?" Elina asks curiously.

"Sort of..." Kirito mutters, "I'll stay out of your way; I just want to rest."

An awkward silence covers the room before Elina breaks it by clearing her throat as she steps out from behind Al.

"You can join us if you want," she says.

The beater smiles a bit and turns in the direction of the boys rooms.

"Thanks, I'll think about it."

Kirito retreats and we are left in the common area with about half of the people from the guild. Without thinking I shoot an annoyed frown at Elina and she shrugs.

"Well, that happened," Al mumbles.

He approaches me and hugs me without even asking. He squeezes me tightly and then backs away a bit.

"Glad you are ok," he says, "How did it go?"

"It was troublesome…" I mumble.

"Yeah, turned out it was all a trap and over half of the people there died," Mirai says, as if answering Al.

"There she is!" Kayla exclaims as she enters the room.

Ruri walks along with herm their arms linked to each other. Can they even be apart at this point? They seem to be turning into some weird…singular being.

"Hey! What's floor forty nine like?!" Ruri asks.

"Cold as f-" I stop myself as I look at Sinna, "a fridge."

"Nice save," Mirai huffs.

"So what was this about a cook-off?" I ask.

"Oh, yeah," Al says and heads to the doors leading to the yard, "We were supposed to do that yesterday, but you took a while to come back."

I pick up Sinna and walk outside with everyone. Sylvianna is rushing from side to side, in and out the inn as she takes things out from the building. She seems to be setting up for her little competition. She's set up two identical work stations so far. A small stove with an oven on each side and multiple cooking ingredients and utensils. I try not to dwell too much into how this works and how she's managed to do this in such a short time.

"Oh good, it hasn't started!" Twyla says as she runs outside, Edelweiss running close behind her.

"So, what's with this cooking thing, sweetie?" I ask Sinna.

"The lady with the pointy ears was going to cook for us but the maid lady said she wanted to do so and then they started fighting," she explains.

"Where are you, maid?!" Sylvianna screams once she sets everything on place.

She places her left hand behind her and as if in an act of magic pulls out a white apron from behind her back. She puts it on and quickly secures it behind her back. She strikes a pose with her hand son her hips and eagerly waits in the center of the yard.

"Right here!" Esra replies as she rushes in from the girl's wing.

She wears and old black and white uniform I've never seen before. I've only seen her with the red and white one. It strikes my eyes in an odd way, I know I haven't seen her in a long time but I never really saw her wear anything that that red maid outfit. She holds some folded clothes in her hands. I quickly recognize that red and white pattern on top of her hands. It's the uniform I've always seen her wear.

She approaches Al and kneels down in front of him.

"Master," she says and places the folded clothes on the floor.

She bows before him and pushes the clothes closer to Al as her eyes face perpendicularly to the floor.

"Esra…come on, stand up," Al mumbles.

"No!" she yells, "I want you to be my judge, I want you to decide whether I should wear this again or not."

"I could hardly have any say on that, come on get up," he insists.

"Please!" she begs, "I need to earn it back and it must be from you."

Al quickly glances around and notices that everyone is staring at Esra's begging. He sighs deeply and bends a knee to pick up the clothes.

"Fine," he says, "You better give it your all then."

Esra raises her head with a smile and stands up. She reaches behind her back and further tightens the apron that goes along with her outfit. She heads to the center of the yard to join Sylvianna and proudly stands in-front of her.

"Yeah!" Hotoka screams as she comes out into the yard, "Siren, get over here!"

"Everyone seems fired up…" I mumble.

"Yeah it's a bit weird, huh?" Aereth says.

"Kind of. When I left, the mood was in the gutter," I reply.

"Well Al says things will take a huge turn after this," he explains.

"Huh, what do you mean?"

"No idea, he just said he wanted to talk about something important after you came back," he says.

"Yeah, yeah!" Sinna joins in, "He looked super excited, it was right after I told them you cleared the floor!"

"I see…"

"Ladies and gentlemen!" Sylvianna announces in a familiar fashion, "We are gathered again in our lovely yard for an event that also has been absent from this inn in quite some time."

Everyone but Edelwiess sits down on the steps leading out from the common area. I set Sinna on my lap and sit in-between Al and Aereth. Esra breathes calmly next to the Elf and merely shifts a little to change her stance.

"Yours truly and the Maid Extraordinaire Esra shall be partaking in a cooking contest where all of you shall be the judges!" Sylvianna explains with a rather flamboyant gesture, "The rules are simple; one dish will be prepared and served to every resident currently staying at the inn, that includes mister Kirito, who just recently checked in."

"Can we bet again?!" Ruri yells from the sidelines.

"Not this time!" Sylvianna answers and does a random twirl.

"Geez, I swear to god, I can't have fun anymore…" Ruri complains quietly.

"I can make anything I want?" Esra asks.

"No, dear, you can make anything you can," Sylvianna replies with a smile.

"I'm tearing you down," Esra snaps back.

"Now, let's get started!" Sylvianna yells.

She quickly rushes to her station and goes back to Esra. She holds a knife roll bag on her hands and with a smug grin approaches Esra.

"Here, I'll lend you a set of knives," Sylvianna says, clearly with demeaning intent.

"Oh please," Esra replies as she materializes a roll bag on top of her hand, "What kind of cook doesn't have her own?"

They seem to be shooting lighting out of their eyes as they stare into each other. Sylvianna throws the roll bag behind her and without breaking eye contact goes back to her station. Both of them set themselves at their stations and get their utensils ready.

"Ready when you are," Esra says.

"We start in ten!" Sylvianna says and a timer appears in between the two work stations.

"I didn't know you could do that…" Al mumbles.

"Well she is an NPC isn't she?" Elina says softly.

Esra rolls out her knife seat on the counter that she's set up and quickly piles up nine empty plates on top of a massive platter. Sylvianna is quick to do the same. The timer reaches zero and both of them fire up the stove. Sylvianna sets a massive pan on the stove and a little pot.

Esra reaches for two pots of about the same size and puts them to the fire. On top of that she reaches for to big casseroles which she also sets over the fire. Esra fills all of her pots and casseroles with water and starts messing with the weirdest menu I've seen in the game. It's a massive grid with a ton of different options. After she is done messing with it she rubs her fingers over one of the pots and casseroles and a strange brown dust drops from her hands. She seems to be all over the place unlike the Elf who is just simply taking pork cutlets from the ingredients area in-between the workstations.

"You are more than free to take ingredients from here," Sylvianna comments.

"That's cute," Esra says and with a few swipes on her menu she takes carrots, meat and a few bags of rice out from her inventory.

"I like the maid now. Her tongue is so sharp, it practically cuts the ingredients for her," Mirai mutters.

"I'm hungry," Sinna groans.

"They just got started, silly," Aereth mumbles.

I turn around to look at him with an eyebrow raised and can't help but chuckle.

"I mean…kid…girl," he coughs loudly and stares away, "They just got started, Sinna."

"Did I hear that right?" I ask.

"Shut up," he grumbles.

"Fine, fine."

I bring my gaze back to the ongoing cooking "battle" and see Esra dumping one bag of rise in one of the pots and two in one of the casseroles. She grabs a knife and pulls a cutting board from under the counter. With amazing speed she slices the things and has a neat little mountain of carrots. I feel Al bumping me with his elbow and turn to him.

"Hey, so…" he says and clears his throat, "Did you manage to change your cursor?"

"No…" I answer.

"But…"

"Yeah, the item didn't work on me," I mumble and get a bit closer to his ear, "Because of the PKing."

"Crap…I'm sorry," he says.

"Don't worry about it, at least I made it back in one piece," I say with smile.

"That you did," he says and bumps me gently again.

I hear some steps behind us and turn my head a little to see that short haired boy standing behind us.

"I was wondering if I could take you up on that offer," he says.

Al turns a bit as well and moves away from me.

"Sure, man," he says, "Take a seat."

Kirito sits next to me and I try not to pay attention. He sits and crosses his arms as he looks at the girls cooking. I don't think I even turned around for that long but Esra is already dumping diced meat and carrots into her pots and casseroles.

The elf is diligently cooking the pork cutlets as she stirs a pot with her hand. I find myself a bit lost as to what they are cooking and decide to focus on Sinna. She is smiling as she looks at Esra and Sylvianna cooking. It makes me glad and at ease to see her smile, it's been a while. By no means do I think she is done grieving but this whole thing feels perfect for her to relax a bit. I hold her close and rest my cheek on her shoulder.

"I'm almost done, maid," Sylvianna teases.

"Are you really?" Esra replies.

"I am," Sylvianna admonishes.

Esra just laughs and I decide to close my eyes for a bit. I rest the weight of my head on Sinna and breathe in deeply.

"My my, is it really the time to be alone with your thoughts?" Mirai butts in.

I press myself closer and sigh.

"Is that a yes or a no?" she teases, "Right, right, can't answer right now unless you want to look like a demented person."

I feel Sinna hugging me and I just lean more into her.

"Are you ok?" she asks.

"Yeah…"

"You sure?" she prods.

"Yeah I'm ok, just tired."

She keeps her arms wrapped around me and I just drift out a bit. I just feel her warmth and manage to isolate myself in it. Everything feels overwhelming lately, there's this void inside me that just grows stronger by the day. It's consuming me and I don't want it near me. Day in and day out Mirai seems to become less and less blurry. It's starting to scare me.

"I wonder, if you actually think you can hide anything from me," she says softly, as if she was whispering into my ear, "I know what's keeping you up at night, I know what you want."

I open my eyes quickly and breathe out in disgust.

"So, are you all together?" Kirito asks.

"Yeah, we are a guild," Al answers quickly.

"I see…" Kirito mutters and stays silent.

"Well, this guy is not awkward at all," Mirai mutters.

A sudden bells chimes and I turn my head at Sylvianna's work station. She has nine served plates with a pork cutlet and some rice. She stands with pride behind her dishes and looks over at Esra to see her reaction.

Barely finishing along with the elf Esra finishes placing rice on the last plate. With a dipper spoon she puts some curry on the other side of the plate. You can see the carrots and meat making that nice contrast on her dishes. She lines up the plates on her counter and the grabs the tray and throws it on the floor.

"Don't be so mad, maid," Sylvianna mocks.

"Mad? I'm just getting the last portion ready," Esra answer.

"What?" the elf replies, "There's only nine residents."

"I count ten," Esra says and dumps a mountain of rice along with an equally big portion of curry on the platter she threw on the floor.

"Isn't that right, Edelwiess?" Esra asks with the smuggest grin I've seen in my life.

"Wait, no, it's just an animal," Sylvianna complains.

"Hey!" Twyla groans with a hurt tone.

"Well, he is wearing a robe," I hear Kirito mumble.

"But, but, but…" Sylvianna whimpers, "No matter, the taste will decide who the winner is!"

"If you say so, but if I'm not wrong this should put you at a disadvantage," Esra says.

You can almost hear Sylvianna grind her teeth as she stands her ground.

"Judges, you may start tasting the dishes!" she screams, sounding a bit unnerved.

"I'll let them start with yours," Esra says as she starts cleaning up.

"Fine!" Sylvianna grumbles.

Kirito gets up and I can already see Ruri rushing towards the food. Sinna gets off from my lap and also runs to the food. I chuckle and stand up myself. We all approach the food and start tasting ourselves.

Sylvianna's pork cutlet is great; like all other NPC food it seems to taste just like the real thing. It's soft to chew on and it goes down easily. The seasoned rice tastes great too, though it IS slightly salty. But, if I remember Esra's cooking correctly this dish is nothing compared to what she cooked.

"Not bad," Kirito mumbles around a mouthful.

"It's yummy!" Sinna says, also through a mouthful.

"Meh, I've had better," Ruri says.

Everyone more or less comments the same. It's not bad, but Esra has us expecting a higher standard. Sylvianna with a smile bows at us and starts cleaning her side. We turn to go over to Esra's counter and we can see her smiling as she stands behind her dishes.

"Rice and curry, brings me back," Kayla mutters.

"Heh, I used to have this like three times a week back in the real world," Hotoka comments.

"My mom used to always make this for me, it's my favorite food," Sinna says.

I grab a plate long with everybody and grab a spoonful of rice. I try to dip it a little in the curry and get a piece of meat along with it. I bring it to my mouth and taste that delicious spiciness. I've missed her food so much. I start really digging in into my plate when I hear Ruri crying. We all stop eating and look at her. Tears frantically run down her eyes as she keeps eating from her plate.

"What?" she asks with her mouth full.

"You are…crying," Kayla says.

"You guys shut up and eat," Ruri answers as she stuffs more food into her mouth, "It's delicious like back in the real world."

Suddenly another cry emerges from the group. Sinna this time. I place my fork over my plate and then set my hand over her head.

"What's wrong sweetie?" I ask.

"It tastes like my mommy's," she cries.

The group "aww"s in unison and ruffle Sinna's hair. We all keep eating the delicious curry when another set of cries emerges. We all turn to the massive lizard that Twyla calls a pet and see him placing its front leg on his now empty tray. He looks at the tray and then at Esra as if begging for more.

"I'm sorry big guy, I didn't make anymore…" Esra apologizes.

Edelweiss whines and then with its muzzle pushes the empty tray closer to Esra. Sylvianna audiblly sighs behinds us.

"Fine!" she complains, "You win, you don't have to rub it in."

"This is seriously the best thing I've had in a while," Aereth says.

"I said don't rub it in!" Sylvianna whines and runs into the inn.

Al laughs and puts his plate down, he goes back to the steps and picks up Esra's uniform. He comes back with a smile and throws it at her. Esra catches it and with beaming eyes looks straight at Al.

"For the record, I want to say you've never deserved anything else than wearing this," he says with a smile, "But since you insist…I think you've earn it back."

With a big smile Esra's equips that red and white uniform and with and contagiously happy aura starts cleaning what's left of the things she used for cooking.

"You are an odd bunch," Kirito says.

"Stick around," Al chuckles, "We might surprise you."

* * *

We spent and awful amount of time just standing out in the yard finishing Esra's food. Amidst the talk we ended up pulling Kirito into our chatter. He seems like a nice guy, but something heavy is obviously weighing on him.

"So what does your guild do?" Kirito asks.

"Well nothing really, we've been trying to keep it low-key lately," Al answers.

"Oh, then what did you use to do?"

"We just stayed together, some quests here and there," Al says.

"We started out helping people," Elina adds.

"Heh, how did that turn out?" Kirito questions, his tone turning into a mocking one.

I can see Al getting visually upset but he clears his throat and decides to ignore Kirito's tone.

"Turned out good, we managed to make our group a bit bigger," Al says, "Even if he had our rough patches, we managed to do some good."

"That's kind of dumb," Kirito mumbles.

"Hey, what the hell is your problem?" Al snaps.

"Oh, I'm sorry, didn't realize I said that out loud," Kirito says.

"Well you did," Al huffs.

"As I said, I apologize," Kirito excuses himself, "Anyways where is that guy Date-Daath I mean?"

"You've said that twice now," I mutter.

"What?"

"Date…or something who are you even talking about?" I ask.

"He hasn't told you yet?"

"Answer my question!" I demand.

"Your blonde friend holds a secret," Kirito says, "A dark one."

"What do you mean?" Elina asks.

"He is still keeping you in the dark, huh?"

I grab Kirito's robe and push him. He stumbles a bit but recovers it a few feet away from me.

"He's dead, you bastard!" I yell.

"Easy now…" Kirito says softly, holding up his hands.

"I will go easy on your freaking face," I say, "Now tell me what the hell you are talking about."

"Your friend used to be a player killer killer," he says.

"Oh my, just like us, huh?" Mirai teases.

"No he wasn't!" Elina says.

"Yeah, he never did anything like that," I say.

"Oh well, maybe he didn't on this iteration of SAO, but he was a dangerous beta player," Kirito says, "Either way, how many times do you think he lied to you?"

"Shut up!" I scream.

"Players like me and him tend to keep a lot of secrets, dangerous secrets…" he says his voice breaking a bit, "Secrets that get people killed."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Kayla butts in from the side.

I suddenly feel very confused. My mind rambles with memories of Daath as I try to make sense of what Kirito is saying. Did I really know Daath? Why is this messing me up so much?

"Datell, that was his name during the beta," Kirito explains, "He was one messed up guy, he really found some really odd enjoyment in killing people. So excuse me for not believing this whole 'helping people' thing you are saying."

"Shut up, you are lying!" I yell.

"Am I?" he says, "I guess you really have no reason to trust me, but I know it's true."

My hands start shaking again.

"Go on," Mirai whispers.

"I also tried helping people," Kirito mutters, "but now they are dead."

He stares at the ground and his shoulder slump.

"It's dumb, don't you think? Thinking that you can actually help people in this world?" He asks.

"It isn't…" Al answers bitterly, "Daath showed me it isn't!"

"Oh, and where is he now?"

I clench my hands into fists and equip my gauntlets.

"You need to shut up!" I say.

"You see that's what happens when you help people in here," Kirito huffs, "You get them killed or die yourself. I wasn't so lucky though, at least your friend was lucky enough to die."

I lunge at Kirito and punch him across the face. He smiles after the punch and then I grab him from his robe and throw him into the yard.

"Aeri, stop!" Elina cries.

"No…" I say as my voice trails off, mixing in the back of my head with Mirai's.

"He died helping us!" I cry, "And you dare to speak ill of him!"

"Since you attacked me first, did you know the system will recognize any attack I do as self-defense?" he questions.

"Shut up you idiot!" I say, ignoring his comment, "You don't get to speak shit about him!"

"I guess he wasn't strong enough," Kirito says.

I activate a skill and close in on him; I raise my hand ready to slash at him. He materializes a sword on his back and pulls it out just in time to parry my blow.

"You hypocritical bastard!" I spit as I back away, "You got people killed as well! You weren't strong enough! You just said so!"

"Oh, no," he says softly and parries my hands again, "I was strong enough."

I throw a kick at him but he dodges easily to the side. His sword shines and he swings it at my upper body. I raise my hand and just barely manage to grab the blade, effectively stopping his swing.

"Than what makes it so different!" I say as I grind my teeth, "You let people die!"

He keeps pushing his blade closer and closer even if I did manage to stop it.

"You see I was strong enough," he says, "I just wasn't fast enough."

He kicks me in the stomach and jumps back to a safe distance. His drops his menu down and starts meddling around it.

"But, I am now," he says as another sword appears on his back.

He draws on it slowly and brings it forward. Both sword shine simultaneously and in the blink of an eye cuts the distance between me and him. He swings at me and I raise my hand again to block. I grab the blade on his right hand but he quickly swings at my arm with the left. He aims just where my gauntlet ends and with a swift swing cuts off my arm. I lose a hand and see the status ailment icon below my health. Not wasting a second he swings both blades at my other arm and cleanly cuts through it as well. I look down at the two weird stubs and fall on my back.

"Cut it out, you maniac!" Al yells as he steps in between me and the beater.

Kirito is about to swing at him as well but he stops his weapons mere inches away from Al's body. Kirito opens his eyes a bit wider and sheathes his swords.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Al asks, "Nothing that you said makes the tiniest lick of sense."

"I'm…sorry" Kirito mumbles.

"You tried helping people…" Al says, "And they died, or at least that's what I got from what you said."

"It was my fault…I wasn't fast enough," Kirito replies.

"Maybe it wasn't your fault," Al says.

"Al, what are you doing?" I ask.

He turns his head to me but then back at Kirito.

"It was! If it wasn't because I kept my knowledge a secret, they would still be alive…Sachi…and the others…"

"Do you even know what Daath did?" Al asks, getting a bit angry.

"No…" Kirito says, shaking his head.

"Daath wasn't this Datell you speak of," Al mutters, "He was kind, strong, and he sure as hell wasn't a liar. He shared his knowledge of the game with us and that's why we are here today. He saved me…he saved us."

Kirito sulks as he stares at the ground yet again. He doesn't cry but he is clearly hurting. I could just get up and beat his ass but my arms aren't done regenerating.

"You come here and start talking shit about him, you are bound to get your teeth kicked in," Al continues, "And not just by her, but this whole guild respected him, even more than they respect me."

"I'm not in a good place…" Kirito says, "I'm sorry."

"Yeah, and I'm sorry to tell you but that's not my problem to deal with," Al states, "But if you think for a second that helping people doesn't do a thing in this world, let me tell you that you are wrong. You are very, very wrong."

I can see everyone that is near the inn with their weapons ready. They look more than eager to step in if Kirito tries anything else.

"If you are strong as you say you are…as I see you are, you are just wasting everyone's time by not sharing that with other players," Al says, "Do what you will, beater, but if you think you are doing anyone a favor by sulking, you got another thing coming."

"I'll be leaving," Kirito says and turns around.

The rest of the guild spreads apart as he goes towards the inn. Everyone is keeping a keen eye on the black haired player as he walks by.

"I'm sorry, for what I said…what I did," Kirito apologizes, "I can't say I knew Daath, but if he managed to forge something… like this, I guess he wasn't half bad."

"You bet your ass," Kayla huffs.

Kirito chuckles briefly and then heads into the common area, disappearing behind the sliding doors. Al sighs deeply and turns around. He crouches and smiles at me.

"I would say to give me your hand, but…"

I look down at my arms and see that they aren't quite done healing.

"You do all this cool stuff just to go back to square one," I say.

"That's just how I am," he says and grabs my shoulder to help me up.

"What the hell was that all about?" Ruri asks as she approaches us with everyone behind her.

"He looked troubled," Siren comments.

"Yeah no, shit," Kayla says.

"Aeri!" Sinna screams.

She gets close to me and hugs me. She notices my hands are missing and her eyes widen in surprise.

"Woah…does it hurt?" she asks.

"It feels very weird," I answer.

I turn my arm and see the damage effect shining brightly right at the part where it was cut. It feels very uncomfortable.

"Well this is a weird time to put this on the table," Al says, "But since we are all here, there's something I wanted to talk about."

"Oh yeah," Hotoka mumbles, "I've wanted to hear about that since yesterday."

"We are leaving this inn," Al says.

"Finally," Kayla says.

"What? What are we going to do?" I ask.

"Well, I've been thinking about two options," Al ponders.

"Well what is it?" Aereth asks.

"Well, you see, that's exactly what I wanted to talk with you guys about."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thanks to DragonofAnnoth for beta-reading this chapter!

I told you not to worry about this Sunday's chapter, because here it is! I will admit kind of slow paced though. And here we have the heart and soul of Sword Art Online, Kirito, making his third appearance in my piece of fiction (props to you if you can actually name the three times he's been featured). I wanted to explore this side of him, the one where he is completely and utterly torn down. I took some liberties obviously mainly at the fact the he is not really shown in this state in the anime or novels. Please tell me how I did if you are leaving a review.

**Silvariux: **Take a wild guess about the course of the story, you seem to get those right haha. **IC0: **Glad to see the action was well received, I really tried to give Asuna a bit of a spotlight, kind of, hope I did that right. I'm so happy someone finally said something about the name of the gauntlets I thought it might've been a little too subtle. All questions will be answered in the next chapter!

Let's address the ugly issue this week. I will be taking a small break with my update schedule, as I mentioned, I've been slacking at writing chapters and thus find myself not comfortable with the amount of chapters I have ready. So my plan right now is to take a week break to write more chapters and be able to return with peace of mind to my usual upload schedule. I hope you guys can understand and to my lovely recurrent reviewers I hope I can still see your reviews after this break haha. I cannot thank you all enough for the way this story exploded. I say exploded cause the amount of views I've been getting lately just astonishes me. I feel so happy that I draw so many of you to read my story. Follows and favorites go up occasionally and the constant reviews just make me ecstatic. As I write this AN I stand at 10,636 views, and it's just amazing. Thank you all so much if you have read this far, thank you for your support, thank you for deeming me worthy! I won't see you all next week, but be sure I will see you soon!

Next Chapter: "No Bravery Without Madness"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 5.- The Other Side**

**Tōkyōtosaiseikai Central Hospital**

**Dr. Sakakibara, Manobu**

"IV is good," I mutter.

"I just changed it Doctor," the nurse answers, "I was meaning to change the catheter bag before you came in, I'm sorry for not doing so earlier."

"It's quite alright, I'm just taking over for today with the checkups, Doctor Inaba couldn't come in," I reassure her and chuckle softly "I still have another twelve rooms to go through."

The nurse ignores my awful attempt at lightening the mood and stands diligently in the corner. I should do what I came to do quickly. I lean over the bed a bit, a teenage girl with the dreaded Nevergear lies peacefully in bed. Her hair seems to be growing abnormally, different lengths on her right side than on the left.

"How are you dealing with the hair?" I ask.

"The staff came into agreement to just let it grow; we are not risking triggering these…microwave bombs. Patients with long hair put the helmet on just fine but girls with short hair or most of the boys seem to be having hair sprouting from the sides of their helmets," the nurse answers, "This girl's hair was rather short when she got here."

"I see," I mumble.

"We do wash whatever we can of their hair and body on a weekly basis though," the nurse says, "Also physica-"

"Physical therapy on a daily basis to avoid muscular atrophy…" I mumble, "Ah…sorry I didn't mean to…"

"Not too worry, excuse for saying something so obvious, I'm sure you are well informed," the nurse nods.

I grab the clipboard hanging from the side of the bed and bring it up. Patient is female, clearly.

"Seventeen years of age. Matsuda, Ran," I mumble softly.

I diligently read her dossier and then put it back where I found it. No special condition, the same as all the other patients I've seen with this death machine strapped to their heads. I sigh deeply and grab the pen light in the front pocket of my white coat. I lean once again and spread the eyelids on her right eye open.

"Blue, huh?" I comment out loud.

It's quite a pretty color for your eyes; sadly I can't say I've had many patients with such a feature. I shine the light on her eye and it reach poorly. This "deep dive" for all intents and purposes could be a state of coma. Studies have shown it's not quite the same but they both share most, if not all symptoms. I let her right eye rest and switch to the left. To my surprise I find a brown-ish iris.

"Heterochromia…" I mumble.

"Yes, she has pretty eyes," the nurse comments.

"That she does," I mutter and shine my light on her other eye.

I let go of her eyelids and back away. I turn my head and quickly check her vitals on the monitor not far from the bed. Her heart is beating nicely and she seems to be well oxygenized. Nothing out of the ordinary.

"Well," I sigh, "That's it, I should be moving on."

"Of course Doctor, I'll be sure to change her bag. If you need anything else I'll be making my rounds on this floor," the nurse offers.

I nod and smile softly at the nurse. I can only wish the staff I have to deal with when in my regular schedule was this nice. I'm heading out of the room when the door opens, mere inches from hitting me in the face. I boy with brown hair still in his school uniform comes in and his eyes widen as he sees me.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," he says.

He stares at me with a puzzled expression and then peeks out of the door in a weird fashion.

"This is room two oh nine right?" he asks.

"It is," I answer.

"Oh sorry, it's just that I'm used to seeing another doctor," he admits.

"Doctor Inaba, should return tomorrow, I'm just filling in," I explain.

"So, how is she doing?" he asks.

"Well, she is stable, not much has changed I assume," I answer promptly, "I'm sorry, are you her relative?"

"Oh, no, no, I'm her boyfriend," he says with a chuckle and scratches his nose.

"I see," I mutter and stand walk out of the room.

The boy unwillingly backs away as I exit and then quickly bows at me.

"Thanks for checking up on her," he says.

"No need to thank me," I say, "Do wait a second though, the nurse will be out shortly."

I walk over to the wall adjacent of the room's door and lean on it for a few seconds. At least Matsuda Ran doesn't have to worry about waking up in a ward with a lot of other people. The thought of why she is one of the few patients with a private room springs to my mind. Her parents, relatives or whoever her guardian is must have a lot of money.

The sound of the door closing snaps my out of my thoughts and I look up to the see that the nurse has already exited the room. The boy is no longer in sight; I can only assume he went inside.

"I wish I had a boyfriend like that," the nurse comments.

"Are you into younger boys?" I joke.

She shakes her head and laughs. So that got her?

"He comes by almost every day; he stays until late at night and he even spends the night some Saturdays."

"I see, what a caring boyfriend."

"He is isn't he?" the nurse says, almost swooning, "Why can't all guys be like that young boy?"

"Beats me," I say with a chuckle, "I believe we have work to do."

The woman shakes her head to snap herself out of her visions of the perfect boyfriend and smiles. She then nods and goes down the hallway.

"Alright then, still got eleven patients to go," I mumble to myself.


	48. Chapter 48 - No Bravery Without Madness

**Chapter 48.- No Bravery Without Madness**

**November/7th/2023**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Sylvie Inn**

**Alshep**

"Ah, there…" Kayla moans, "A little more to the right…"

"Ok…you sure?" Ruri asks, running out of breath, "Tell me if it hurts."

"Just, go, slowly…" Kayla answers.

Kayla's nonsensical moaning grows louder and I just cross my arms. Honestly I feel quite irked, here I am gathering everyone for a serious talk and Ruri starts massaging Kayla. Worst of all is their damn line of conversation.

"Wait…" Kayla quivers.

"Oh my god shut up!" Aeri snaps, "She is just giving you a freaking back rub!"

"But it's so goooood…" Kayla mumbles.

"Can I stop covering my ears now!" Sinna asks out loud.

"Yeah, sure…" Aereth sighs as he stops covering her eyes.

These morons, just when I want to be cool and serious. Better get started though, better late than never.

"Hey come on, I'll give you one," Ruri suggests.

"No! Well, let me think…" Aeri answers.

Ruri sneakily makes her way towards Aeri and I slam the small table in front of me to get everyone's attention.

"So, as I was trying to say…" I mutter, "I wanted to talk with you all about what we are going to do now, you know, as a guild."

"Yeah, we've been just sitting around for a while now…" Kayla mutters.

"I know that," I reply and stand up, "We were more or less forced to go into hiding because of something I've suggested. I don't know about you but, I'm about done with hiding."

Everyone nods and silently stare at me.

"So what I've come up with is…not so simple," I admit.

"But you said you thought of two things…" Hotoka says.

"Well, yeah. But I don't think it's gonna be easy to settle on one," I explain, "I think it's a bit of a delicate topic."

"I think I know where this is going…" Siren mutters.

I sigh and try to gather my thoughts. I'm going to be giving them the two options I've thought of. In a way I feel guilty and kind of a bad person for not asking what their thoughts on the matter are, but…it seems logical to see these two options as the only ways to go right now.

"Steel and Swords, our guild, can do one of two things right now," I pause, "Number one, we go back to what we were doing, start helping people again. Maybe even expand a bit further, level up to start helping the clearing parties."

"And two?" Aereth asks.

I narrow my eyes for a second as I stare at him. If anyone knows about option number two must be him, after all, he practically suggested it.

"Option number two is…" I start, faltering for a moment, "We hunt down the people that have been making our lives hell. Make them pay."

"The Snakes, huh?" Kayla asks.

"Formerly, yes, they are now part of something called Laughing Coffin," I correct.

"Are you really considering that?" Elina asks

She stares at me, she looks confused and worried. I can't blame her, I didn't discuss this matter at all with her and I'm quite literally proposing the idea of making it our one and only goal to hunt people. But I have to put it out there it's been in my mind for a long while and to an extent, I would be more than happy by erasing Klaus' existence.

"Yes, and I'm willing to bet than more than one person in this room would agree to take that route," I answer.

My gaze quickly paces through Esra, Aeri and Kayla who I'm inclined to believe would rather take option two. Elina's expression towards me is not a pleasant one but I think I more than deserve it for keeping her in the dark.

"I can't believe you are actually considering that second option," Elina says softly.

"Would you really blame me?" I ask firmly.

"I would expect you to know better," she answers frostily.

I know my words are staining the mood of the room, I can literally see the expressions of my friends turn a bit sour.

"Now, we have to decide on this as a team," I continue, "I guess voting would be in order but I would like to hear everyone's opinion on the subject. So if anyone wants to speak out…"

Kayla stands up suddenly, her hands clenched into tight fists and shaking a little she stares at the ground. She is bothered - that is easy to tell - but I have a feeling I'm going to like her answer.

"It's about damn time you asked what we want to do with Klaus!" she says and raises her sight to meet my eyes, "Let's hunt those bastards down, make them pay! We owe to Kato…Owl, Regi, and Daath!"

Kayla was never too vocal on the topic. Hell, she was never really vocal on anything until a few months ago. This change of attitude in I've seen in her, this "real her" as she says, I like it. I nod at her and cross my arms, however just slightly to the right I notice Hotoka isn't very pleased with her answer.

Hotoka stands up almost flipping the table in the middle of the room. Glasses clatter against each other and some of the food finds its way to the ground.

"No! We should go back to helping people! Isn't that what Steel and Swords is all about?" she says, "Helping people, giving players another chance? Like you did for us?"

Promptly Siren rises and stands next to Hotoka.

"I need to agree here, are we going to turn into some kind of maniacs that hunt down people? There is already enough madness in the world; there's no need for us to add to it," she says flawlessly and without a single stutter.

Her eyes for a brief second meet mine and she turns her head away in that awkward fashion only she can manage.

"I…I mean…like...after all when I joined you told me you were all for helping people…" she mumbles.

I fell a faint smile take form in my face. I see where they are coming from and it makes me feel so freaking amazing that they hold this idea I formed in such high regard. But to my disgust I find a stronger urge deep inside of me.

For a second I can't help but to glance at Elina. I think she's already made her stance clear but once I gaze at her it seems like I've chosen her to speak next.

"I don't want more people that I love to die, not while in this prison, we should go back, make this guild bigger, stronger, and try to make an effort to clear this game at the very least," she explains, "I'm really disappointed in you guys for wanting to risk everyone to get back at some player."

Elina's words cut deep in more than a few people, myself included. Expecting some kind of lash out from Aeri I start getting a bit anxious but surprisingly I can only see her fiddling with a cup of water as if Eli's words went in through one ear and out through the other.

"Disappointed? Is the really the word?" Kayla spits, "If we are throwing around trash like that, allow me to also say I'm disappointed in you! This 'player' killed four of your friends, and yet you would rather ignore it and go back to doing nothing, back to this life you've grown so accustomed to, huh?"

Kayla, realizing her own outburst, pulls her act together and coughs a bit.

"I'm ever so sorry for wanting a bit of justice to be served," she finishes, reverting to that lady-like tone she used for almost a year.

Elina appears exasperated by Kayla's words. In any other situation I would say Elina would cry at any moment but she is just angry at Kayla's remark.

"Hey calm down," I intervene, "This is not the time to start snapping at each other."

Kayla and Elina stand back from each other and sit down, they both try to calm down but it seems like tension is a bit high.

"Master, if I may…" Esra mutters.

"Go ahead," I reply.

She steps out from my side and places herself in the center of the room. She places her right hand on her chest and speaks out.

"I would like to go after this 'Laughing Coffin'. I will not allow them to go unpunished after what they've done to us," she states, "I understand why some would like to stay out of this but I would like to avenge our fallen friends."

I'm starting to see a pattern here, those who've been with me longer are leaning towards hunting Klaus. Who can blame them? The only one so far who doesn't seem to want any kind of payback is Elina.

"I wouldn't mind getting Klaus…" Ruri mumbles, "I'm tired of sitting around, tired of being scared of what he might do next."

"Mister Leader, sir!" a high pitched voice exclaims.

Sinna raises her hand from Aeri's lap and sticks out as high as she is able to. I point at her and nod, Never thought she would have something to say on the matter.

"Do I get a vote?" she asks.

"Well, you are part of my guild, so yes. What would you like us to do?" I say.

"I think we should go do what you were doing!" she says energetically, "Aeri told me a lot about what you guys did and it sounds super awesome and nice."

I nod at her but I can't help but put a little bit of disapproval in my expression. The small girl notices this and pouts before speaking again.

"I know you've lost friends, people you loved," she says, "I have too, but, I think we should be doing good things instead of hurting other people…just because they hurt us."

"I know you are not gonna like this, but I'm done doing stupid stuff, I want us to go back to what the guild used to do," Aeri says, "At least that way we can relax a little bit…"

"Well I gotta say I'm surprised," I say, "Well, not that I'm gonna argue. Aereth, what's on your mind?"

I put the guy in the spotlight, but I think if I didn't, he would never have said anything.

"I'm doing whatever these two are doing," he says and points at Sinna and Aeri, "So I guess we go back to helping others."

And we reach a draw. Even though I'm yet to tell everyone my take on the matter I want to go after Klaus. But I guess there is no point in forcing everyone to do something they don't want to. I'm conflicted, on one side this itch to get pay back will remain without scratching but on the other side, I'm glad. I'm glad of the people in this guild, glad that want to go back to what we were doing. They are better people than I am, being able to see past all this pain and to rise above it as better individuals. I've got much to learn, I just hope this decision is the right one.

"I guess we are going back then, back to our home," I say, "We'll have to be careful though."

Despite the different opinions everyone nods. The only one still visibly upset is Kayla, and I get her. Maybe she just needs to let out some steam but her frown and body language are pure rage right now. She storms off to the yard.

"We will leave tomorrow so, be ready," I say and follow Kayla.

I step out into the grass and see her kick a little of it off the ground. It's somewhat refreshing to see this side of her but I the same time I feel her anger and sadness course through me.

"I'm sorry," I say.

"You don't have to be," she spits, "I just…just…"

She screams and kicks the grass again, bits of dirt and grass fly through the air again as she does.

"It's not fair you know?" she says, "I get that they don't want to be in more danger that we already are but…we owe to them Al. We owe it to them."

Her voice twists a little at the end of her sentence and I finally realize exactly why she is acting the way she is.

"Hey I get it," I say, "But maybe there is some other way we can go about, maybe tell the Army or something?"

"Dammit Al…I know you get it, but why did you vote against it then?" she asks, "I know no one wants to get back at Klaus more than you…even if Aeri did what she did you are the one who wants to see that bastard pay more than anyone, I know it."

"I don't want to put anymore of you in danger, I want you all to see the end of this nightmare," I say, "I do want to get back at Klaus, make him pay for everything he's done…but maybe right now it's not the time."

"Promise me one thing please," she says.

"What is it?"

"Just promise, alright?"

I cross my arms and nod at her.

"Before we get out of this hell hole…you will make him pay," she begs.

* * *

"You made the right choice," Eli mutters.

"I'm not so sure."

She takes hold of my hand and turns me to look at her. She seems calm now, considering Kayla's lash out anyone else would've kept a bit of a grudge but thankfully Elina is a calm and collected person.

"You did, I'm sure of it," she insists.

I sit down and rest my back on a nearby tree. The forest that encloses the inn is a pretty quiet one and since the space back at the inn is quite limited, it offers the only space where you can get some privacy as of late. Elina sits over my lap and takes hold of my hand again.

"You know I still feel like I'm not even getting the hang of this," I mutter.

"Of what?"

"This guild, being a…leader," I admit, "I'm not fit to be one, Eli."

"You are," she reassures, "We've gotten so far because of you."

"But at what price?" I mumble.

It's dumb to hide it any longer with her; if I do she'll just keep prodding until I open up. I'm just surprised I didn't do so earlier. You would think you should be able to share everything with the person you love but for some reason it just makes it harder, tougher to do so.

"I've screwed up Eli…somewhere along the way…I know so," I whine, "If I didn't more of us would be alive…everyone would be alive."

I grind my teeth and squeeze Elina's hand.

"I know I can't go back but every night…I wish I could, I wish I could do some things differently, but I can't…"

"We need to keep moving forward…" she says softly.

"But it's hard dammit…" I say, "What do you think I've been doing all this time?"

It's true; I've been doing my best to keep it in. It has probably slipped out here and there, but I haven't had time to process everything as much I would want to. I need to stay alert, to keep busy in order not to think about it. I wish I could say I'm over it, that I'm ready to move on, but I'm not. It haunts me to this very day.

"Why didn't you tell me before…?"

"We all had a lot in our plates," I answer, "There was no point in making you worry even more."

"You are supposed to tell me about stuff like that," she says and holds my head close to her chest.

"I keep telling myself that it'll be alright, but I just don't know Eli…" I mutter and wrap my arms around her.

I shouldn't be like this; I need to be stronger, for everyone not just for my sake. Hunting down Klaus would've just been an excuse to do so. It would've been an easier excuse. Now that is no longer on the table and I need to deal with that fact.

"It will be alright, as long as we are together," she says, "As long as we help each other, we'll be alright."

I stay a while without saying anything else, trying to calm myself down a bit.

"You really need to tell me what you are thinking," Eli whispers.

"I know…I should, I'm sorry," I answer.

"I think Esra is excited to go back to the house," she says, trying to change the subject.

"That she is," I chuckle.

"I miss our bed," she says with a laugh.

"It is comfy."

Elina gets up on her feet and I quickly follow. I still lean a bit on the tree but it's merely to steady myself. The light filtering through the tree becomes fainter as the minutes pass. We merely slipped out for a few minutes, but I really needed this.

"So should we go recruiting? Or level up to maybe assist the clearers?" I ask.

"Whatever you think is right, leader," she says with a smile.

"Well I guess we'll see where this takes us," I say.

* * *

CRYSINA HERE! My god it's good to be back!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thanks to the awesome DragonofAnnoth for beta-reading! (This guy is so awesome for putting up with me.)

SO WE ARE BACK! Yay! I will admit this chapter is criminally short, even more so after the last like five chapters I've put out, but it feels right you know? We finally closed up another story arc and next week we'll be heading into the penultimate arc of my story, I'm very excited. Also I'm quite surprised to see all the views my story got even though I went a week without updating that's really cool.

I really have no further comment other than welcome back to anyone who had been waiting and thank you for being so patient! As always if you like what you read, want to pick on me or whatever, please leave a review! I'll see you all next week!

Next Arc: "**Fragmentize**"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 6.- Lies**

**Aeri**

It's nice and cozy; his body is warm and soothing. I rest my head against his chest and sigh out in relief.

"Geez stay on your side," he mutters and pushes me a bit.

"But it's coooold," I groan with a smile and get close to him again.

"Your mind is the weirdest thing I swear," A voice mumbles.

I jerk my buddy to a sitting position and look around nervously. I feel a cold hand creep up my right shoulder and turn around to see him. I gasp in a small moment of panic and fall off the bed. He stands up, confused as he approaches me.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

"No…no," I stammer.

"No, what? Aeri what's wrong?"

He comes closer but I back away with every step he takes. I can't help but to fixate my eyes on a sword protruding out of his chest. My eyes dart around between the blade and his white, vacant eyes.

"Daath…" I wince and cover my mouth.

I close my eyes and cover my ears, like a child trying to avoid something she knows is inevitable. Once I open my eyes again I find myself in white void, along with her.

"Fun dream you were having," Mirai teases.

"Shut up," I say before I break into tears.

"Hey don't go saying nasty things like that," she says sarcastically.

"Stop messing with me! I hate you!" I yell.

She laughs and paces around in a small circle.

"Well isn't that cute."

I jerk my body as I wake up gasping for air. My eyes go around the dark room as I see everyone else in peaceful sleep. Their futons are on the ground not far from my own. I bring my hands to my head and rub it gently.

"Either way, I was meaning to ask," Mirai prods, "Why did you lie to our dear friend Al?"

I shake my head and blink consciously for a few seconds. Mirai blurs in just in front of me and raises an eyebrow.

"Hey, it's rude not to answer when someone asks you a question," she pouts.

"He can't, he would stop me…or worse," I whisper.

"He would join you," she says with a smile, "Why turn down such an opportunity? You and your best friend hunting those Giggling Caskets or whatever."

"I need to do it alone," I murmur.

"Until someone finds out," she laughs, "And then, what will you do?"

Again it's one of those times when I'm forced to agree with her. Then what? What will I do? I need to talk with him about this, tell him what I really think. I stand up slowly and sneak my way out of the room. The inn is very quiet at night and the floor tends to be a bit noise when you are walking around.

"You and Al, partners in crime," she says, "Gotta say I love the idea. Maybe that way we can get closer to him"

The smile I see in her face after she says this disgusts me and I quickly close my eyes and shake my head to ignore her. Without noticing I find myself on the very edge of the men's side of the inn. Only two futons are laid out on the floor, both quite separated from each other. I approach the one on the rightmost side of the room and luckily I see Al's sleeping face as I lean over to look at him.

I get on my knees and slowly crawl the last few inches over to him. As I place myself closer to him he opens his eyes and I jump at him to cover his mouth with my hands.

"Keep quiet…" I whisper.

He places his hand on my fore arms and slowly moves my hands away from his mouth.

"What the hell are you doing?" he asks.

I struggle to find the right sentence in my head but ultimately decide to go with the simple answer.

"Hunt Laughing Coffin with me," I reply.


	49. Chapter 49 - Retrograde

**Chapter 49.- Retrograde**

**November/7th/2024**

**? – ?**

**Alshep**

"So it all came down to this, huh?!" he yells from the very bottom of his being.

My heads up display is giving my instincts a real run for their money at telling me how close I am to dying, but there are things that take precedence at this moment. On my knees I throw my body forwards and reach for my sword. I take hold of it and bring it close to my side. I clutch at my chest, at my new shiny wound that gives off a disturbing red glow.

"Now that your friends can't help, what will you do?!" he asks, "You are all alone now!"

Klaus holds Elina's paralyzed body by her hair as he presses his sword against her neck. Aeri groans uncomfortably next to me. Just glancing at her I can see her face and body, riddled with glowing scars as she winces in pain. I need to move, move dammit! I stumble up on my feet and even though I'm closed to dying I'm filled with strength more than ever before. Move!

"Al it's ok…" Elina says softly and smile.

"No it's not," I huff and raise my sword in front of me.

"Listen to your girlfriend dumbass, it's over!" Klaus says.

"Al…please, it's going be alright," she insists.

As I'm about to start running her way when she hits Klaus with the back of her head and unsheathes her sword from her side. Her short sword shines brightly but so does Klaus' blade as he raises it above his head. My body tenses and my mouth suddenly goes dry, but I hear my voice screaming.

"Elina!"

* * *

**December/31st/2023**

**Fiftieth Floor of Ancrad – Algade – Algade House**

**Alshep**

"It's been like half an hour since I ordered my ramen…" Kayla complains and leans back.

The ragged-backed bench that passes for a booth creaks loudly as she rests back, which makes her sigh in annoyance and lean forward again. Siren stares intensely at the menu, unsure what to order, despite there being a grand total of three items.

"Algade Soba…or Algade Grilled?" she ponders.

"Just get whichever, service is crappy anyways," Kayla pouts.

"One Algade Soba!" A scruffy man yells as he literally drops the bowl of food in front of Kayla.

Liquid from the bowl splashes around and manages to stain my shirt. A piece of thinly sliced meat jumps out from the bowl from the impact and finds its way to Kayla's chest plate. She growls like some kind of angry bear but as she is about to stand up Hotoka arrives to place her hand on Kayla's shoulder.

"Hi, sorry I took so long," she says.

"Yeah no worries," I say and scoot over into the booth to let her sit, "So how's that deal on the fifth floor going?"

"Well, Aeri seems to have it under control, her friend from the Knights of The Blood might consider us for the next boss, though they still say we should level up more," she explains, "The guild wasn't there so they had to talk with this guild called Fuurinkazan ."

"Well yeah that makes sense," I mutter, "What about the new guy?"

"Billfray?" she asks, "Well I mean he seems like a nice guy, but I haven't had much time to talk to him. I think it helps that Aeri knows him."

"He's kinda cute," Siren purrs.

She quickly shakes her head and coughs loudly.

"Kinda weird!" she spits, "I meant kinda weird…"

"Either way…" I mutter, "This place is horrible; why are we even here?"

"It's kind of secluded, good for a private talk," Kayla explains.

So that's what this is about. Never took these three for the sneaking around type.

"We've been meaning to talk to you about something, we just weren't sure of how to do it," Hotoka says.

"What is it?" I ask.

"Aeri…has been sneaking out of the guild house," Siren says.

I raise an eyebrow and tilt my head a little to the side. The three of them look troubled by this and I have to admit I am myself. I bring down my menu and send Aeri a message to come over, explaining that I need to talk to her.

"I would appreciate if you just told me next time, this feels rather unnecessary considering you are telling on a fellow guild member," I huff.

"I…uh…we didn't mean for her to get into trouble," Hotoka says.

"Yeah, we just thought you should know since it could be dangerous," Kayla says.

"Thanks for telling me, I will talk to her about her, this shouldn't be happening anyways," I reply.

I rest my elbows on the rackety table and sigh out, trying to appear upset. I'm clearly doing a good job as both Hotoka and Siren seem very anxious with just my change of posture. I've grown to be a bit volatile when someone isn't careful lately. I can't have anyone doing stuff on their own it's risky.

"Al, don't be too rough on her, maybe she was just doing some extra leveling, you know?" Kayla mutters.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll see about that," I huff, "Please leave us alone when she gets here, if you don't mind."

All three of them stand up as I finish my sentence and leave me alone to wait for Aeri. Just as I wanted them to, it'll make it easier to talk to Aeri. I wait for a few minutes in silence until I hear a set of hurried steps drawing closer to the small establishment. Aeri emerges into the place and I treat her to an irritated glare, trying my best to say 'I told you so' with my eyes. As soon as she realizes what my look means, she sighs and rolls her eyes.

"Dammit, who told you?" she says.

"Kayla, Siren and Hotoka. If you are going to be sneaking out, at least you have to be discreet about it," I scold her, "And even then we agreed to do so together."

"It would be easier if we weren't trying to be this sneaky," she complains.

"It's the only way it'll work right now, so at least try to get good at it."

She rolls her eyes again and rests her arms on the table. Without noticing she spills the bowl of questionable ramen all over her and in a fit of anger slaps the bowl away. I hand her a napkin and with a face of utter disgust she tries to clean her clothes.

"What the hell is this place anyways?" she says, "It smells like ass and I'm pretty sure this thing wasn't edible."

"They wanted a discreet location to tell on you," I say and stand up.

"I'll try not to wake anyone up next time," she mumbles.

"And you'll tell me next time as well," I demand.

"Right…I'm sorry, I just wanted to follow up on a lead…" she says.

"Do tell."

She stands up and tries to wipe whatever is left of the putrid soup. Realizing she soiled her clothes more than she expected her eyebrows furrow and kicks the booth. The sorry excuse for a seat collapses after her kick and she blows air through her nose, looking satisfied.

"Hey, what the hell?" the players tending to the place complains.

"It's not my fault, your table was shit," Aeri spits.

I leave the small place and cover my eyes as I come out into the sunlight that graces Algade. Of all the damn settlements in the game, this one has the most buildings, yet sunlight still manages to hit me in the face through this labyrinth like city.

"If you touch me I'll tear this piece of crap you call restaurant down!" I hear Aeri scream as she hastily steps out of the establishment.

"If you don't leave I'll report you!" the man screams back.

Once she comes out of the place and notices Aeri cursors he stops on his tracks. He takes a few steps back and starts shaking.

"What are you even doing inside the city?" he asks.

"This city's criminal code doesn't kick red players," Aeri smiles.

The owner of the small restaurant closes his doors and you can hear an array of locks going off behind the door. I sigh and stare blankly at Aeri.

"I see you are in a good mood today," I comment.

"Whatever," she huffs, "Anyways I think I got something big, but first would you mind getting something for dinner?"

I raise my eyebrow at her sudden and seemingly random change of topic and cross my arms.

"Are you asking me out on a date, Aeri?"

I'm kindly reminded that Aeri is not the kind of person that enjoys my jokes, as I see her leg swiftly taking off from the ground going into a neat, almost perfect straight line to my groin. This is the kind of time where you would like to have your Ethic Code on and not disabled to avoid this kind of abuse to your most private parts.

"I have a friend that owes me a meal, dumbass," she says.

I hear her words ringing in my ears but I feel the strong need to breathe in and out for air at a ragged, almost erratic pace as I find myself kneeling on the ground. I nod at her trying to avoid any further confrontation.

"Fine…" I heave and with wobbly legs get myself on my feet, "I didn't know you had any other friends."

I see her stop on her tracks and hear the subtly noise of her knuckles cracking. I swallow my own spit realizing it was probably a poor choice of words. Immediately I set my hands to guard my tender regions and take a step back.

"It's like you are asking for it," she says with a sigh.

"Hey, come on, buddy, girl," I huffs, "We have such a long, rich history together, do we really want to engage in such nonsensical violence?"

She shakes her head and starts getting closer. Accepting my fate I look up at the sky. Still that damn sunlight manages to get into my eyes before I'm knocked on my ass.

After apologizing and pulling myself off the ground, Aeri explained this meal thing. Apparently during her fight to clear the forty ninth floor she met a member of the Knights of The Blood. In some weird bet she managed to win a meal from this knight, which apparently we are using an excuse to get something to eat.

Walking through Algade is quite the task. Streets are narrow and since it's kind of the newly opened floor it's flooded with players walking about. It's kind of fun seeing how almost every single player starts hugging the walls as we walk through the street. I feel an odd, uncomfortable feeling of reminiscence as I walk behind Aeri, only being able to focus on the orange cursor over her head. And that's when I manage to place the strange feeling, I've done this before. Almost a year ago, in a barren, muddy canyon. In the recesses of my mind I feel an urge to slap myself, evoking such an awful memory so clearly in my head.

"So where is this friend of yours?" I ask.

"She said to meet up with her in a weapon shop, she keeps to inns so she is going to borrow a kitchen," she says.

"So it's a she," I ponder, "Wait, she's is going to cook for us?"

"Yeah, it was part of the bet."

We keep walking through the crowd and we reach Algade's teleport gate. Aeri stops and so do I stretch a bit as I look around. Barrowdell is cramped with people but somehow this floor manages to be even more claustrophobic. My only guess is that players feel more invasive than NPCs.

"Aeri!" I hear behind me.

A girl with light brown hair nudges me to the side as she rushes to Aeri.

"Hey, how you doing, knight?" Aeri teases and brings the brown haired girl in for a hug.

From the side I can just see the girl's cheek blush a little as she is lifted off from the ground by Aeri. I chuckle a bit and watch her flail her feet in the air as she tells Aeri to set her down. For just fighting alongside each other for a day they seem quite close already.

"Geez, I haven't seen you in like a month and just come out and hug me," the girl complains.

"Geez that hurts," Aeri pouts, "What about those intimate messages we've shared."

"What was even intimate about those?!" the kinght retorts as she points her finger at Aeri, "We just chatted a bit."

I cough loudly getting their attention. The girl turns around quickly and tilts her head, her friendly demeanor taking a dip and she proceeds to frown at me with annoyance.

"You need something?" she asks.

I feel a sudden urge to guard all sensitive areas of my body as I feel her now not so friendly face staring directly at me.

"This is a friend of mine, the leader of our guild actually," Aeri explains, "You mind if he joins us?"

"Oh, sorry," the girl coughs, "Sure thing no problem."

She extends her hand to me and every inch of my body just screams me to be careful about my next move. I grab her hand and I feel her firmly clasping her hand around mine.

"Asuna," she says.

"Alshep," I answer.

"Well let's get going, I'm actually on a bit of a tight schedule."

Asuna and Aeri take point as they start chatting some nonsense. It's odd to see Aeri talking to another girl. I mean Elina and Aeri used to talk about anything back in the day but since she came back and adding on top of everything the whole hot springs incident they seem incredibly distant. It's not like she ever talked a lot with Kayla to begin with. It's nice though, a welcome change. I guess it's really self-absorbed of me to think she can't develop outside our little group but I guess it roots from everything that's happened.

Absentmindedly I follow the two girls until they suddenly stop in front of a rather small door. Asuna opens the door and leisurely walks in. This must be that weapon shop. I follow behind Aeri, but I can't help but think something is missing from the façade. There's this huge empty spot over the door where I could easily picture a sign, can't help but to feel this is being remodeled. As I walk in I can only feel my thoughts couldn't be any more spot on.

A small array of weapons and shields hang from the wall closest to the door, but yet the wall manages to look empty. Further scanning into the place I can see a few shelves but they also look rather empty.

"Agil!" Asuna screams.

That rings a bell.

"So we are just borrowing a kitchen?" Aeri asks,

"Heh, calling it that is a bit of a stretch," Asuna replies.

I stand idly and the silence after Asuna's words is broken by what I can only place as a bunch of stuff falling down and making a mess on the floor, something heavy probably. Shortly after I hear the clanging sounds of metal clashing against more metal behind a door on the back on the room. Swords, maybe.

A big, tall, black man that I remember from the first boss comes busting out from the door, with an expression I can only describe as fear.

"A-A-Asuna! I didn't expect to get here so fast!" he yelps.

"Yeah, I'm sorry, can we really use your stove?" Asuna asks.

"Yeah, yeah, by all means! It's right upstairs, it came with the place so I'm sorry it's not much. I was actually planning on removing it," he rambles.

His eyes trail off to me and he raises his hand, pointing at me.

"You're that guy," he says.

"Yeah, yeah I remember you too!" I answer.

"That chubby man from the raid, yes I definitely remember you!" he says.

Aeri starts laughing hard enough to make her double over, followed by an ever so subtle chuckle from Asuna. Why can't I ever have a nice moment, or just someone not pointing the fact that I may be slightly chubby? I grimace and cough to try and expel every single bit of my being that was hurt in that sentence.

"Yeah, that guy," I answer, "But don't call me that. I don't go around saying that out from the whole raid, probably the whole game, you were the one bla-"

"Anyways!" Asuna shouts and heads for the door Agil came out from, "Thank you so much, Agil!"

I'm practically dragged away with Aeri as she pulls me from my arm making me trip a few times until we are all the way up the stairs. The second floor of the small building is as small as the one below but it has a modest sized bed and a seemingly random places stove next to the wall.

"You guys like Salisbury steak?" Asuna asks as she drops the white and red attire for a more normal set of lounge clothes.

* * *

"So, the gist of it is, clearers are hesitant to let your guild join unless you level up some more," Asuna says.

I finish the last bite of the best god damned Salisbury steak I have ever had in my life and with a satisfied smile set my fork and knife on top of the plate. I lean back on the small stool I'm sitting on and put my plate on top of a box.

"I guess I can't really argue with that, but we'll get there," I say.

"I have to say I'm surprised," Asuna says.

"About what?" Aeri butts in.

"I kind of expected your guild leader to also be a red player," Asuna admits.

"Nah, he's a goody two-shoes," Aeri says with a smile.

"I try to keep a clean operation," I joke, "Aeri here is the product of the affirmative action initiative."

"Ha ha," she replies monotonously.

Asuna laughs heartily and starts cleaning up the small area she used to cook. Aeri kicks back a little and takes out a bottle of some alcohol out of her inventory.

"I think a toast is in order then," she says.

"I think we are missing the glasses," I tease.

Out of her inventory come three glasses which she sets on her lap.

"Well you think about everything, huh?" I keep teasing.

"That I do," she says and sticks out her tongue.

"Well don't blame me for thinking like that," I smile, "You've never been the brightest star in the sky."

"Simmer down a bit guys, your banter is really harsh," Asuna says.

"Nah it's ok," Aeri says with a chuckle.

She proceeds to pour three glasses of clear liquid. She passes one over to Asuna, the next to me and after pouring the last one she sets the bottle on the floor and stands up. I stand up as well and bring my nose close to the glass, I give it a big sniff and realize it doesn't smell a lot like booze.

"What is this?" I ask.

"Vodka!" Aeri says.

"And you poured us a whole glass of it?" Asuna asks.

"Yup! To joining the clearers!" Aeri says.

"Dammit, what the hell," I mumble, "To joining the clearers!"

Asuna sighs and pushes her glass close to ours.

"To joining the clearers," she mutters.

After downing a whole glass of digital vodka Aeri and I find our way out of Agil's soon to be shop. The day seems to be breaking into an uneventful and rather boring new year. The usual drowsiness fades away quickly as we reach the teleport gate of Algade once again. Aeri shakes her head and rubs her eyes before bringing down the teleport gate's menu.

"So you never told me about this lead of yours," I prod.

"Oh yeah, we are going to check that out," she says, "We are going to floor twenty two."

"What for?"

"I found out they will be doing something in the fields there," she explains, "I'll make a run for the south exit of the settlement. Meet you there."

"Right, be sure not to get killed," I say.

She chuckles and lets her head hang a little to the side.

"I've outrun those guard things a couple of times, it'll be alright," she grins and disappears to the lower floor.

I select floor twenty two on the menu and in a quick second I find myself in Coral. In the distance I see Aeri running away with a couple of NPC guards giving chase. At a brisk pace I follow the direction she went in. She is fast; she's always been fast. At a light jog I reach the south exit of the settlement just as the guards finish chasing Aeri out. She seems a bit out of breath but is standing, trying to keep a cool posture as I approach her.

As I exit Coral I can't help but to notice the vast hills and fields that spread before reaching mountains on the edge of the floor.

"How are we even going to find them here? This place is huge."

Aeri turns her body to the side and points at a field in the distance. Groups of people can be seen in small bunches. Bright lights shine in the distance at what I can only describe as some sort of party. It is New Year's Eve after all.

"They wouldn't be so dumb…" I mutter.

"It's all I have to go on," she says, "They said something about ruining today's celebration."

"Fine," I say, "Let's get going then."

I walk past her and start heading towards the field. It takes more than a few minutes but when we finally reach the field we choose to stay behind a modest tree line, perched up on the trees to keep an eye out. I sit with one of my legs dangling from a tree and the other spread out through the trunk of the thick branch I'm sitting on. All in all I find myself oddly comfortable. Aeri is on the tree to my right, sitting as well as she stares off into the groups of people having their "party".

"Maybe these guys out the field are a guild…" Aeri says.

"Seems about right I guess, they are like what?" I ponder for a second, "fifteen people, give or take?"

She nods.

"I'm sorry that we aren't back at the house right now," she says, "I'm sure they must be sort of celebrating as well."

"It's alright; everyone thinks we are up to some important business or something like that."

A bell rings in my ears and I bring my menu down to look at my messages. Elina has sent me a message.

"Speak of the devil, huh?" she jokes.

"I guess," I chuckle.

-From: Elina  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: Happy New Year?  
-Message: Hey, are you guys going to make it back soon? Esra made a cake, it's really delicious haha. I was kind of hoping we would spend today together, you know? Well, just make it back if you can, love you! 3

"Dammit…" I mutter under my breath and hit the trunk of the tree.

"Something wrong?" Aeri asks.

"I kind of forgot…" I sigh, "Eli was really looking forward to today…it's like five minutes to midnight."

"Maybe we can make it back soon," she says, "We just wait for them to show up and observe them, try to get some faces."

Her head quickly turns to the side and she points with her hand at a group of players, all dressed in black as they approach the players we've been watching in the field. I jump over to Aeri's tree and stand close to her.

"Speak of the devil," I joke.

"I didn't think they've grown so much in number…" Aeri mutters.

I stay silent for a second as I try to count the amount of orange cursors I see heading over the group of people having their party. I lose count at twenty one and gulp down my fear.

"Aeri there's too many of them," I say.

"Yeah, no shit," she replies.

The group of red players all brandish their sword in wicked coordination and as soon as they are out of their sheathes the blades start shining in multiple colors.

"No, no," I huff, "we have to do something!"

"Stay put!" she says, "What do you even want to do, fight them?"

They keep approaching the players inch by inch, the green players oblivious to the fact that a murderous group approaches them.

"Happy New Year!" the party yells with glee.

Their shouts of joy turn sharply to screams of terror as the red players fall on the unarmed players, breaking the gathering into a flurry of screaming people and flashing Sword Skills. I jump down from the tree and draw my sword but before I take a step forward Aeri tackles me, throwing both of us behind some bushes.

"Don't do anything stupid," she whispers close to my ear, her tone completely changed.

Her morbid voice makes me freeze as I stare at the black figures cutting down innocent people a few feet away from us. In between the leaves and small branches I see their swords shine and attack people that are screaming for their lives.

"Look at them, and do so closely," Aeri says, "Look at their faces, look at what they are doing."

In between the flashes of light of people dying and Swords Skills going off I see Klaus, the man with the skull mask, and his leader PoH.

"Look at them Al. Look at them so you can remember what we are up against."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Thanks to DragonofAnnoth for beta-reading this chapter!

ARC 4! Haha this week is back to more or less the average chapter size, I hope I appropriately set the tone for this arc. Not much to comment on other than that. We are more or less drawing to a close and to a whole year of Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds! That is AMAZING! I never thought it would go on this long haha. I sort of expected to stop at some point like I did before but here we are! GOING STRONG!

**IC0: **There will be lots of cliffhangers this arc, so get mentally prepared!

So either way, short AN this week. If you want to say anything at all please leave a review. I know that at least 40 something people come back to this story now and then so why not say like hi or something? Haha this pathetic attempt at begging followers to review done, I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Trailing Shadows"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 7.- Sun Kissed**

**Aereth**

Compared to a while ago everything has been going smoothly. I could get used to this guild house, I get my own room, a place of peace and quiet of my own. Not to mention the roof is an excellent place to sunbathe. I'm starting to get a bit too comfortable and I fear what this may mean to the whole structure I used to have just a few months ago.

Sinna rolls over on her belly and groans loudly, clearly indicating that she is already bored out of her mind and would rather be doing something else. I have my eyes close but I can tell her hand is slowly moving to my face, she is about to poke me.

"Aereth…" she mumbles as she pokes my cheek, "I'm bored…"

"I told you sunbathing wouldn't be very fun for you," I answer.

"I wanted to try it out though, you are always doing it…" she whines.

"Well that's because I enjoy it," I say.

I open my eyes for a second and see her sitting a little bit close to my face she lies down on her back and spreads her arms and legs apart.

"What's the point of wearing a swimsuit if there is no water!" she yells.

"So you can soak up the sun, I already explained this."

"You also do this in real life, right?" she asks, "That's why you are tanned, right? Oh my god! You live close to the beach, right?"

I sit up slowly and rub my eyes a little; I nod at her and turn around to face her. She is about to ask a bunch of question I regularly wouldn't like answering but I'll answer anything she wants today, maybe that way questions will decrease in the future.

"I used to live by the beach, in Nanjo, all the way down in Okinawa," I say, "Every weekend, if time allowed we would go down to the beach. My parents didn't like going to the beach as much as me and my sister did, so most of the time it was just me and her."

"Himari, right?" she asks softly, knowing well I don't like talking about her.

Hell, it's no surprise the conversation is going this way; I just thought she would wait a bit to ask about her. She has asked more than a few times about Himari, mostly because my stupid head slips and I call her that. I can't help it; she is too much like her. I'm no idiot, she is not her, but I can't help but seeing my little sister in Sinna.

"Yes," I mutter, "We went down the beach all the time, even if my parents didn't want to go. We would hop on my bike and I would take us all the way down the beach."

"You never, answer when I ask about her," she says.

Starting to get a bit irked I stand up and put on my shirt.

"Yeah, there's a reason as to why I don't," I answer harshly, "I don't like it."

"I'm sorry!" she yells, "I just…want to know more about you. Besides…you are like always confusing me with her and stuff…"

"I'm sorry about that, it's just that you look like her," I answer.

"She is dead...isn't she?"

My blood goes cold and the feeling of warmth I've been trying to collect all morning in this roof is quickly erased as the words escape her mouth. I turn around unaware of my own expression and look down at the small girl.

"Please don't push me Sinna," I mutter.

"I'm...I'm sorry, it's just that sometimes, when you sleep…you call out to her," she says and hangs her head a little, "Like Aeri says I do…to my sister."

"I don't want you sneaking into my room anymore," I answer.

I head over to the small trap door that leads down into the guild house and crouch down to open it. As I'm about to jump down I feel Sinna's hand on my arm. She starts pulling me away from the door.

"My sister is also gone…because of this place," she cries, "I just want to help…or something…please."

"Himari didn't die here," I reply and get her hand off my arm, "She died five years ago."

I can feel her back away and hear her trying to formulate a sentence I'm sure even she doesn't know where it's going. But nothing comes out of her mouth.

"You remind me of her a little too much, I'm sorry if I've been cold to you or anything like that in the past, but I can't afford to like you more than I already do," I explain, "So please, just stop asking about her…and stop being so nice to me…dammit."

"I'm sorry," she says sounding withdrawn, "I just thought I could help…like you helped me…"

I feel awful, idiotic, I breathe in deeply and sit down on the floor again. She is just a kid, what the hell is wrong with me? She hasn't been asking because she is nosy, she is just being kind to me, like I was to her.

"No, I'm sorry," I say, "It's just that…heh, you are just like her, you know?"

"How old was she?" she asks.

"Nine," I huff.

She sits as well, a bit far from me but she stares directly at me. I feel odd, back when I met Sinna we had this conversation but it was the other way around. It was to help her deal with what happened to her sister, but it seems it's her time to help me.

"She even used to tie her hair up like you do," I point out.

"Hehe, it's because it looks cute," she says with a smile.

One never really gets over the death of a loved one. No one is comfortable facing reality but sooner or later you have to do so. I never allowed myself to properly grief Himari. It was hard to believe, harder to accept.

"You know, I've never been to the beach," she says softly.

"Maybe I can take you there sometime," I say.

"Really?" her eyes spark with joy.

"Sure…" I mutter, "Yeah, hey why not?"

It's not like I ignored it completely, I just decided to distract myself. I moved to Tokyo got several jobs to keep me busy. But here, it's been hard to ignore, I can't exactly keep myself busy like I used to in this world.

"Pinky promise?!" she says and extends her little finger over to me.

I smile for some reason; I guess more or less I dug myself into this situation. I link my pinky finger with hers and see her smile widely.

"Heh, alright, I'll take you there one day," I say.


	50. Chapter 50 - Trailing Shadows

**Chapter 50.- Trailing Shadows**

**January/12th/2024**

**Forty Ninth Floor of Ainrad – Crystalice Valley**

**Esra**

"I keep thinking it would've been alright if you hadn't come along," Aeri presses.

"The house is all clean and there's nothing pending, it only seems logical that I came along with Master," I reply.

"It's ok, Esra, we're just going treasure hunting," Master says.

They say that, but I have this gut feeling that they aren't here just to look for some rare item or something of the sort. They are both spending too much time together and disappear for hours every other day. I've been assigned to manage training more than once since they have to go do something together.

"I insist," I answer with a smile.

I fear the worst, what if my Master is cheating on poor Elina. My heart can't take that, my heart would break. Aeri leaves for a while and comes back as this unruly temptress; I cannot have this kind of behavior to invade our home. I must get Master out of this path of infidelity.

"So what item are we looking for?" I ask.

"Uh…well it's uh…" Aeri mumbles.

"A weapon…" Master mutters.

"Right! A weapon!" Aeri says, "It's this kind of sword that's supposed to drop from a rare mob around here."

"Yeah, it's probably going to take a while, so don't feel obligated to stay," he says, "Think of it this way: it's your day off."

My god, it's worse than I thought, they can't even come up with proper excuses now.

"Not to worry, I'm more than happy to come along," I say trying to put on a fake smile.

"Alright then…the mobs we are looking for shouldn't be that far," Aeri says.

Right after finishing her sentence she takes hold of Master's arm and pulls him along with her a few steps ahead of me. I try to give chase but realize looking overly proactive might not work in my favor for this particular situation. I try eavesdropping on whatever they are conversing about but a sudden gust of wind and the fact that my straining really isn't that high to overcome it leaves me with nothing to hear but the wind whistling in my ear. I grow a bit impatient and want to get closer but I hold myself still.

I open my coat a little a bit and trace my hand over the throwing knives and picks on the inside of it. I might need these since we are hunting monsters but I wish I brought something other than my dagger. I sneeze because of the cold and then close my coat tightly again.

"Master can I have a word?" I say loudly.

He turns his head around quickly and then says something to Aeri I still can't seem to catch. He then frees his arm from Aeri's grasp and joins me. As he walks next to me I feel my boots going a bit deeper into the snow. It seems terrain will get a bit hard to traverse from here on out.

"What's on your mind?" he asks.

"Master, why are we here?" I ask.

"We are looking for treasure," he says.

"Why are we really here?" I correct myself.

His gaze goes straight to Aeri walking in front of us. He coughs loudly and for no apparent reason and proceeds to scratch the back of his head in what I can only assume is a desperate search for excuses. It truly is worse than I thought.

"I don't think I can really tell you," he mutters, "It's truly best if you head back home."

What can't you tell me master? That you are having an affair? Cheating on our sweet Elina just because this devious vixen is more…developed? For shame.

"Master, you shouldn't be doing this, not after all this time," I say, "Not to Elina…"

His face grows a bit worried and he even presses his right palm against his temple.

"I know…it's not, even more so after the inn," he says.

No it can't be true, no. I can feel my heart shattering into small pieces but instead of saying something mean to my Master I try to take another approach.

"It's not too late Master, you can apologize, and maybe she can forgive you!" I say, "Elina has a lot of kindness in her heart."

"No…no she won't, not after what I've done with Aeri," he answer.

My mind starts spinning all kinds of indecent acts and horrible scenarios. My Master, a pig, I could have never imagined, that's heartless. More than heartless, he is a monster. I feel my lips tremble as I'm unsure of what to say next. I also distance myself, feeling sudden disgust at my new found information.

He move quickly over to me and takes hold of my shoulders.

"She can never find out, ok?" he says, "Not ever, please, she would never forgive me."

"God dammit, Al!" Aeri exclaims as she turns around, "You are so weak!"

"You guys are disgusting!" I yell and back away from them.

"Yeah, yeah, call it whatever, we are just doing what feels right," Aeri.

I stare right at my Master, judging him with my eyes. I just can't believe it, it's truly despicable. Aeri sluggishly approaches him, treading deep snow as she does. She grabs his arm again and brings him close to whisper in his ear. I can't help but to keep backing away, not really minding my step I trip and fall on my back into soft snow.

I do my best to get back on my feet but the constant snowing and the already deep snow leave me feeling like a tortoise that somehow managed to roll on its back. I struggle to no avail and only manage throw snow in multiple directions. I collect myself and sit up only to see that Master and Aeri are unnervingly close to me.

"Esra, you can't tell anyone, not a soul," Aeri says.

"So that's why, you are going to start helping us out," Master says.

"Wh-what?" I stammer, "No way, no! I don't want any part in whatever you two are up two!"

"Come on, you already found out," Aeri says.

"Yeah, and besides, we could use the extra pair of hands," he says.

"No! No! I never took any of you for that kind of deviancy! It's disgusting! You are already cheating on Elina and top of that you want me to join?!" I yell, "For shame! Shame on you two!"

"Cheating on…" he mumbles.

"Haha, what?" Aeri exclaims.

"We are going after Laughing Coffin, Esra…" he explains.

A moment passes as I blink in incomprehension.

"Oh…" I mutter, "Of course, yes…"

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

Aeri helps me on my on my feet and gently pats snow out of my sides and back. I feel ashamed and embrace myself, trying to give myself the slightest bit of solace, given the false accusation I just made.

"I…apologize," I say slowly.

"It's ok…" Aeri mumbles, "But crap if you are thinking that I don't want to find out if anyone has a crazier idea in their heads."

"Christ, Esra…I would never do that!" he exclaims, looking unfathomably upset.

"I understand, but I still think I'm allowed to be quite mad," I exhale.

"How so?" he asks.

My opinion back in that hidden inn still remains true. I'm actually irked that he didn't consider me for this. I would gladly aid him. As my previous suspicions are laid to rest, new ones rise and once I feel my feet steadily on the ground my tongue seems confused as to what question formulate next.

"Why didn't you tell me earlier?" I ask.

"Well I thought…it wouldn't be right, after what we agreed on in that inn…"

"Who else know?" I continue.

"Only you," Aeri butts in.

"Do you plan on telling others?" I prod.

"No," They both answer.

The wind gains center stage yet again as we grow silent and it courses loudly around us.

"Well it depends…" Aeri says.

"What?" Master questions.

"Well, think about it Al, it would be easier to hunt them," she says.

"And harder to keep a secret!" he snaps back.

More often than not Master's words ring true, however this situation is already quite dangerous without me in the equation. Have they not been thinking about fallout? What if the Laughing Coffin realizes we are going after them? The Guild house is secure but it still is dangerous. Besides, it would be naïve to think they haven't been keeping tabs on us.

"Master, if I may?"

"Yeah?"

"What exactly have you been doing to them?" I ask.

"Killing them," Aeri answers for him.

The response is out of her mouth in a heartbeat and she locks her eyes with mine as if waiting for me to say something about it. I turn to my Master, seeking an answer from him, he merely nods and I cross my arms as I try to process things. I have no opinion on the matter, at least not one that differs greatly from hers but perhaps her approach could be a little less scary.

It may sound hypocritical; after all I would be eager to do the same, to see justice be served. But Aeri has been doing just for a long while, for over a year now. What kind of toll does that take on a person? I finally manage to divert my gaze from her eyes and notice a slight twitching on her hands. She is craving something, but what?

"We're wasting time," she says, "You in or not?"

"I am," I state.

"You sure?" Master asks.

"Yes," I reassure.

"Great let's get moving," Aeri says and again starts treading snow in the direction she was heading to.

I let her go ahead of us, trying to have a few private words with my Master.

"Is…she ok?" I ask softly.

He starts walking as well and I even have to hurry up a bit to catch up to him. I start thinking that he may be ignoring my question, but then he answers.

"I don't know anymore."

LBLBLBLBLBLBLB

It's like being shown a whole new world, it's odd, exciting but also…terrifying. Apparently they have only been doing this hunting of theirs for a few weeks. I always thought I would know everything in the house, I would know the secrets; I would know what everyone is doing. Sadly I've never been more wrong.

My Master is a player killer since just a few weeks ago. However his cursor remains green. It is somehow scary, he's killed someone, and I might too in the future.

"There's still a lot of things I don't understand about the whole deal, I would ask Argo about it, but she no longer speaks to me," he says, "I think it has something to with them being red players, that or them attacking me first is what's been keeping me safe from a red cursor."

I nod at him trying to make sense, trying to accommodate in my mind and believe the words that just came out of his mouth.

"It sort if sticks with you, it's not pleasant," he says.

"I would imagine so," I say.

"But at the same time, it felt right, you know?" he says, "It feels like he deserved it…"

"He did, Al, and the faster you get that into your brain, the faster you'll stop caring," Aeri says

I feel horribly conflicted, had we all decided to go down this path a few weeks ago we would all at least already have one kill under our belts. It's wrong to kill, everyone's been taught that since they were little, or at least I would like to think so. And yet here we are, hunting down people as if they were animals. We are contemplating murder, desperately trying to find ways to justify it.

I want to avenge Owl, Daath, Kato, Reginald, but what am I willing to sacrifice to get that done? Never in my life have I ever been so lost in thought. I walk alongside Master, pushing my legs through the deep snow as we follow Aeri. I feel a knot in my throat but I'm yet to decipher why it's there.

"You'd also better stop spinning the idea so much in your head," Aeri says as she turns her head to me, "You know very well what coming along means, and I'm sure there's no determination lacking in you. But please also get it into your head."

"What exactly should I get into my head?"

"You are going to kill them and they deserve it, it's as simple as that," she says, "Now, let's pretend we are a couple of low level players walking around here."

"Huh? Why?" I ask.

"Rumor is that people dressed in black have been ambushing players around these areas," she says.

"So we are bait?" I ponder, "Isn't there a less dangerous approach to this?"

"We can take these idiots, don't worry," she mutters, "If things come to worse Al and I have unique skills that will surely help us get out of whatever pickle we get ourselves in."

"I thought you still had a couple of hours on Blood Lust's cool down," Master comments.

"I can force activate it but it will draw from my health faster," she explains.

"Yeah, how about we don't do that?" he says.

"The idea is to not use it, but if things come to worse…" she mumbles.

Master rubs his neck gently and sighs out into the cold air. He hangs his head to side a little and breathes in deeply.

"I have a few knives and picks covered in paralyzer, which should help no?" I intrude.

"Yeah, they should," Aeri says, "Keep an eye out; they shouldn't be that far away."

A few minutes of walking put us on a snow covered ridge, walking becomes an easier task as the snow stops clutching at our legs, but it still is quite slippery. Rocks are scattered across the ridge, perfect place to stage an ambush if I do say so myself. Some rocks are big enough for people to hide behind and this area is just far enough from any kind of town or settlement that you could easily get the drop on any unsuspecting players.

Aeri stops ahead of us and raises her hand, signaling us to stop as well. We heed her order and stand just behind her. Master and I scan the area with our eyes trying to look for any other players or a sign but we come up with nothing. That is until we look ahead from us where there are clear signs of numerous scattered foot prints on the snow. The pattern is incredible erratic, judging by the information we have and some simple deduction it would only make sense to assume someone was attacked here, and that they tried to fight back.

"Get on your knees and no one has to get hurt!" A woman yells.

I can see a smile curling up from the side of Aeri's face as she raises her hands and starts kneeling over the snow.

"Alright, play along," Master says.

I nod and kneel over the cold, fluffy snow as well. I slip my hands into the front of my coat and grab a knife and pick before raise my hands and placing them behind my neck.

"Are you good with acting?" Aeri asks me.

"I did some plays back at school…" I answer.

"Give them your best fragile girl in distress why don't you?" she says softly.

I nod and clear my throat as I see three black hooded figures step out from several rocks along the ridge. The closest one is a woman, probably the one that ordered our surrender and just by the looks the other two should be men.

"Please….we don't want any trouble!" I plead.

"Oh we don't either dear, but it all depends on your cooperation," says the woman.

"Please, just let us go!" I cry "We were only passing by!"

She removes the hood from her face, revealing her face. She has short black hair, the left side of her head in a very low shave. A long scar crosses her left eye all the way down to her lip. She smiles widely as she stares at us and then I feel my blood run cold as she looks past us with and even bigger smile.

I jerk my head a little as I make an effort to look behind me and see another black clad figure approaching us.

"And just what are you going to do with those?" the man approaching us from behind asks.

I feel Master's sight fixate on me and I shrug a little. I see Aeri's hands glow brightly as she equips those gauntlets of hers. My master's hand drops quickly and he takes hold of his sword. I raise a knee and feel as time slows down, I hear my heart beat as I pivot quickly and throw a knife at the man behind me.

Managing to throw the knife right at his face I hear Master's sword slide out of his sheathe and Aeri's steps turn into hurried ones.

"Go help Aeri, I'll take this guy," Master orders.

I nod and take hold of my dagger. I pull the weapon from its sheathe on my lower back and run to help Aeri, though she apparently is in no need of it as I find her punching through the first man on her side. She yanks her hand from the man's gut and with an open hand claws at the man's face, leaving small straight lines of damage across his face. The other guy quickly draws his sword and activates a sword skill as he rushes Aeri's side.

I make it just in time to deflect the attack that would've hit Aeri in the ribs. My dagger clashes against the glowing sword and sparks fly lazily into the air as we pull back our blades. The man loses no time and attacks again but this time his rage is centered on me. I raise my armed hand and feel him crash down on it with his sword. This man is perhaps too strong for me, but he isn't smart. I place my left hand on top of my right one and push his sword away with all my strength.

He takes a few steps back and I take a few forward. He tries to unleash another attack on me but I duck and take hold of his right leg with both of my arms. I grab his leg tight and twist my body to the side making him fall, once he is down I let go of him and let him slide down a few meters on the side of the ridge. I stand up and turn slightly to side, Aeri delivers the final hit on the man she is attacking and as if annoyed swats the little bits of shiny crystals that the man used to be. The woman in black draws a huge war hammer and lunges at Aeri.

I turn around and see the man I toppled just getting on his feet. I make a small jump forwards and position my feet in order to slide down all the way down to him. I struggle a bit to keep my balance but ultimately jump again as I approach him. Trying to go for my first actual attack I activate a skill and aim for his head. However he raises his sword and by just adjusting his position takes my momentum into his favor and impales me into his blade. Something that could've been avoided were I a little bit more careful, I guess I misjudged him.

"What a dumb move," he spits.

My stomach is in a weird stinging pain as I look down at the sword clearly piercing it. As I raise my head again the man head-butts me and I'm left a bit dizzy.

"It WAS a bit dumb, huh?" I mumble.

With my left hand I grab the man's hand that is taking hold of his sword and bring my right one over his wrist. I turn my dagger to its serrated edge and start to viciously saw his hand off. Surprisingly it only takes three full strokes to detach the hand from his weapon. The man screams; he's probably new to the feeling and steps back, falling back on the slanted side of the ridge. His hand remains a few seconds still clutching his blade but then it burst into tiny crystals of light. I take hold of the sword hilt and pull it from my stomach. I drop the thing on the ground and slowly walk over to the man.

"What the hell did you do to my hand?!" he screams.

"I cut it off," I answer simply.

I finally understand Aeri's resolve, it really doesn't feel wrong. It feels like they deserve it. I open my coat and sheathe my dagger. I take hold of all the knives and picks on the inside of my coat and start throwing them at the man on the ground.

I throw a knife at the stub he now calls a hand, followed by a pick right above it. Hunting quality animals for cooking requires incredible finesse with these things. And this is no different, I stand over an animal, the only difference is that I won't be cooking this one. One by one the knives and picks I throw embed themselves into his skin. He groans as each one drives in through his clothes, as each one drains just a little a bit of his overall health.

I throw the last of my knives and aim for his throat. My throw is spot on as I nail the little bit of his neck that is exposed. I walk even closer and from my inventory materialize Owl's mask into my hands.

"Do you recognize this?" I ask as I present the mask.

"What?"

"Do you recognize this?!" I yell

"I have no idea what that is you crazy bitch!" he seethes.

"Then you are of no use to me," I say and kneel next to him.

I pull my dagger out once again and start stabbing the man's chest. My hand finds no problem in driving the small blade in and out of the black clad player. Neither does my head. There is that little feeling in the back of my head yelling that this is wrong, that I should stop, but there's another that overpowers it. One that says that this is the right thing to do, that he deserves it. It takes a lot of stabs to kill him but I stop counting after the seventh one.

The body disappears into thin air before I breathe out as I find relief for some reason. I understand how sick and twisted that is but at the same time I reason that I did nothing wrong. Goosebumps run sharply through my skin and I rub my arm slightly to try and make them go away.

"You are trying to figure out if it was right or not…correct?" I hear Master say.

I nod and stand up slowly.

"It was the right thing to do, right?" I ask.

"It feels like it was, but I'm not sure…" he says.

I feel his hand over my shoulder and I put the mask back into my inventory. I turn around and see his face has a short straight line of damage over his nose.

"Master, you are hurt!" I say as I reach out to touch his nose.

He backs away with a laugh and rubs his nose.

"It's nothing, haha, he only dropped my health to half full," he chuckles.

I see his eyes glance to the top corner of his eyes and that's when I become self-conscious of my own health. I stand under thirty percent full. Not enough for the system to start telling me that I'm in danger, but enough for the bar to start changing from an orange color to stronger red shade.

He digs into his pockets and hands me a potion.

"Be a little bit more careful next time please…" he says.

"Next time…" I mumble.

He notices the tone of my words and looks behind him as if trying to make sure Aeri isn't nearby.

"I can convince her to let you stay out for this," he says.

"No…I need to help you," I mutter.

"Let me go!" A woman screams.

"Shut up," Aeri's voice replies.

We look over the top of the ridge and see Aeri dragging the short haired woman from her leg. Once she is over the ridge Aeri throws her down over to us. The woman rolls unwilling and as she comes closer to us I can see both of her arms seem to be bound behind her.

Aeri casually walks down over to us and steps on the girl's head once she catches up to her.

"What are you going to do?" Master asks.

"We are going to try and get some information from her," she says.

"We've never done that before," he answers.

"Well you haven't…" Aeri mumbles.

"I won't tell you anything psycho!" the girl screams.

Aeri laughs a bit and props the girl up, she makes her sit on the cold snow and takes a firm hold over her legs.

"Give me your dagger, Esra," Aeri demands.

I turn to my Master quickly, looking for further instructions. He just nods and crosses his arms. I nod at him and reach behind me. I slide the small blade out of its' sheathe and hand it to Aeri. Aeri brandishes my weapon in front of the woman's face and over so gently pokes her cheek with the tip of it.

"You don't scare me," the girl says and spits at Aeri's face, "I'm not telling you anything."

I hear Aeri chuckle as she cleans her face. She sighs deeply and I feel yet another wave of goose bumps go down my spine.

"Ok then," Aeri huffs, "I'm going to conduct an experiment, so be sure to keep your answers concise; it may be difficult to describe the feeling of your legs being cut off, but give it your best shot, hmm?"

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

UPDATE! 26/11/2015.- DragonofAnnoth has now beta-read this chapter and I have applied his revisions!

Have I said that I like Esra? She is a nice character, devoted and stronger than she seems to be and there might be more of her in the future. The story will get a whole lot darker if you can't already tell by this chapter and the previous one haha.

**jadewolf: **even if you did leave that review at chapter 2 I hope you cath up soon to read I very much appreciate your support thank you and your brother! **IC0: **Haha don't go placing your money on deaths just yet...or do haha.

I bit of bad news...I lost this chapter earlier in the week and had to rewrite it and I literally just finished doing so, so I apologize if this is a little rough. It will be beta-read by DragonofAnnoth but that will be either in the coming hours or days. But be sure I will update it sometime this week. Other than that or potential spelling mistakes this chapter isn't bad at all. AND I ALSO HAVE GOOD NEWS! This coming week is my last week of this semester so that means a lot of free time coming soon! I plan on finish writing Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds before the year ends! Horray for 50 weeks of Stee1 and Sw0rds!

That is all for this week and I'm sorry but there is no extra chapter this week. You all take care and if you like what you read please leave a review, I'll see you all next week. No teasers this week!


	51. Chapter 51 - Unstable

**Chapter 51.- Unstable**

**January/16th/2024**

**Forty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Forest of Giant Flowers**

**Aeri**

"You should be more careful, at least try to keep a low profile…" the maid says, "I mean, there haven't been any comments from our guildmates, but it doesn't take a genius to notice your outings."

"You see, I like the maid, but I always thought she was the servant. Why the hell is she barking orders at us?" Mirai mumbles.

Her condescending tone is uncalled for; I have been careful, more than she has. Just what the hell is more suspicious? That the girl that has always come and gone from the house to keep sneaking out? Or for the ever so diligent house dog to suddenly start disappearing for extended periods of time?

"I like her support, and she's reliable, but god damn is she annoying," Mirai complains.

"I've been careful, but you certainly haven't," I reply.

"I've taken the utmost of care in all of this," she snaps back.

"Of course you have!" I say sarcastically, "You've been so careful, you've forgotten to make food a couple of times. It is not at all suspicious how suddenly you go missing from the house."

"Point taken…" she exhales, "geez…"

"Well yeah, fucking think before you speak next time…" I mutter under my breath.

"What was that?"

"Nothing," I answer with a smile, "Now, come on, I want to get back and take a shower."

My attention is suddenly fixated on my feet. As I place one foot in front of the other, practically dragging me across this damn forest.

Flowers as tall as trees, what a dumb idea.

I try to roll my eyes, but they can only go so far, otherwise I would be looking right at the back of my skull. I would rather be doing this with Al; he keeps his mouth shut and only talks if necessary. Or at the very least, he tries to.

"Well, aren't you having fun, huh?" Mirai teases.

I ignore her; obviously, I can't really speak directly to her with Al's lap dog at my side. She would have something to say on the matter, meaning that she would have to open her mouth. Out of which would come out words, annoying words, words that would criticize me, words I don't want to hear. I close my eyes tightly as we keep walking through the dumb forest.

"Why don't you tell her?" Mirai suggests, "Tell her that you hate every single thing about her, tell her that you hate how smart she is, tell her that you hate how close she is to Al, tell her everything! Out with it now, what good will it do if you keep it bottled up inside?"

It wouldn't work, if I were to do that, things would get weird, I can't handle more weird stuff. I would break, I'm already pushing the limits but somehow I manage to find ways to keep making the ceiling higher. Ignoring Mirai, trying to keep myself busy, I even started doing yoga in the mornings. It's hard to empty my mind lately, I just want to be left alone, but I can't seem to catch a break.

We stop for a brief second right in front of a very large bush. Not only does this forest have large flowers but a lot of regular flora is oversized as well. A big bush is just the perfect place to take cover in. You can see hundreds of stiff branches blocking the way to its center, the perfect place to hide something.

Esra takes point and pushes past the leaves of the oversized bush. I follow her closely, jumping over branches and watching out not to trip over anything. This bush hides a really small shack, a place where we've been keeping someone.

Someone who refuses to cooperate.

"I wonder if she'll talk today, I mean, with the maid here I'm not so sure," Mirai says, "You should ask her to let you do it our way."

Esra seems to have taken more than a few steps ahead so I finally feel safe enough to whisper a few things without looking insane.

"She won't let me," I say softly, "Al strictly said to not torture her anymore…"

"Screw them; we only cut her legs off once!" Mirai complains, "Do you even remember what you we did to those snakes back when Regi was alive?"

A clear and almost too vivid memory comes to mind, I shake my head, trying to ignore it but Mirai decides to keep talking.

"That guy we slowly chopped into pieces as his friend watched," she laughs, "That was one way to get them talking!"

"Shut up…" I mutter.

"Oh come on, you know it works, I know it works, why not show the maid?" she says.

I make a conscious attempt to get closer to Esra, that way I will have an excuse to ignore that damned shadowy figure. I see Esra stop in front of a small door. I stop myself and place myself just next to her.

We stare for a few seconds at the well hidden structure. Anything other than the door is hardly visible, the walls and roof lay hidden behind thick leaves and branches, truly a safe house in the middle of a rather dangerous area.

"Alright…" the maid mumbles, "Let's get this over with."

She pushes the door in, and the door makes a creaky sound as it swings ajar. The inside is shrouded in thick darkness. My eyes can only make out a vague silhouette inside, I know too well who is in here but I keep my mouth shut and sheepishly follow Esra as I'm anxious to see her reaction.

"Master and I agreed to at least keep her with a small light source," Esra complains as she looks around for a lantern in her inventory.

Finding it quickly she lights it up to reveal the girl we captured a few days ago. The member from the Laughing Coffin is hanging from the ceiling by her left leg, thanks to a rope I tightly secured to one of the beams of the small shack yesterday.

The girl breathes rapidly through the sack I placed on her head and tightly secured with another rope around her neck. The fabric of the sack quickly pulls in around her mouth and then away as her breathing becomes more and more ragged.

"What is this?" the maid asks surprised, "Aeri, why did you leave her like this?"

"Well, I didn't really like not getting any information from her in the past days, so I had to improvise," I explain.

"This is inhumane!" she complains.

I laugh bit and get closer to her to the point her my own nose is a mere inch or so away from hers.

"That is rich," I huff, "Do I need to remind you that the decision to keep her alive and captured was yours? You've submitted this girl to this; I just made a few adjustments to her accommodations."

She stares at me with unwavering eyes. She swallows uncomfortably and then turns away, avoiding meeting my eyes. That's right, she understands, she won't complain anymore now. I wish I could just tell her. Tell her that there is no humane way to get her to talk. The only way this girl will talk is if we make her suffer, if we humiliate her and hurt her beyond reason.

"What are you going do to her?" she asks, but then shakes her head, "What are we going do to her?"

"As I said, she is reliable, just try not to give her any reason to talk," Mirai says.

I smile a bit and turn towards the upside-down girl.

"Well, for starters," I chuckle and take a step back, "Let's make sure she is awake."

I take one big step forwards and kick the girl's face as I move forward. I can hear her grunt in a bit of pain as my boot connects to what is probably her jaw. I really can't tell with that sack covering her head.

"Yeah, that's right!" Mirai yells.

"Wakey, wakey!" I exclaim.

I bend a knee and pull the sack off of her face. Once I do she gasps for air as she tries to desperately look around the room.

"Please put me down!" she begs.

I walk behind her suspended body and trace my hand along her back; she quivers as I pull my fingers along her body. I set my hands over her wrists which are bound tightly with more rope behind her back. Tightly grabbing her wrist I turn my body slightly and stare for a few seconds at the lovely maid.

"I have something in mind to make her talk," I say, "However…I need you to shut up while I do it and to not try and stop me and to not tell Al at all."

"What do you have in mind?"

"It's a yes or no thing," I answer.

"Please put me down!" the girl begs again.

Esra looks at the girl for a few seconds, then her sight diverts to me. Her eyes linger but after another set of straining seconds she nods.

I extend my hand to her and place the other on the girl's ankle.

"Give me your dagger," I demand.

Barely processing my request she reaches behind her back and places the dagger on my hand. Gripping it tightly I bring it up to my face. The serrated edge is a nice touch, certainly something I never expected from the ever so diligent maid. I guess back in her prime this blade had an alternate purpose.

"Please! Please let me down!" the girl says once more.

"Alright then," I huff.

I place the serrated edge of the small dagger on her ankle and start sawing away.

"Just cut the rope!" she screams in discomfort.

I ignore her and keep slowly but surely digging the blade deeper into her ankle. I keep my hand doing the fluid motion of pulling away and pushing back in for a short few seconds before I completely manage to detach her leg from her ankle. The girl's body drops to the ground, she hits her head against the hard wooden floor and the rest of her body limply falls over.

"Aeri…" Esra whimpers.

She covers her mouth and then takes a few steps back. The maid finds no more room behind her and completely presses her back against the wall not too far from the door. She widens her eyes at the black-clad girl complain on the floor.

"Why are you such a hypocrite?" I ask, Mirai's voice synching perfectly with mine, "You killed her friend the other day. So you don't get to chicken out now!"

"You're crazy!" the girl screams.

Her words feel like a stinging blow in the back of my head, grinding my teeth I turn quickly and deliver a kick to her gut. As my boot makes contact with her stomach she gasps for air and curls into a fetal position.

"Shut up!" I yell, "I'm sick and tired of coming back here every to see if you want to talk or not! So today we are doing it my way! You either talk or you die!"

The girl laughs a bit and she finds the nerve to look at me right in the eye.

"If I'm so valuable to you, you will never kill me!" she says, "I'm your one and only source of information right now! You couldn't kill me even if you wanted to!"

I bring down my menu and throw the dagger at the ground as I do. I equip my gauntlets and hear Mirai softly whispering into my ear.

"Prove her wrong."

My hands slowly raise themselves to my neck and my fingers dig slowly into the side of it. Esra makes a lousy attempt at stopping me but before she even takes a step forward she takes two back and forces herself to stay with her back against the wall.

"Bloodlust," I say gently.

The gauntlets extend to my shoulders and I dig my right hand into the girl's thigh. She winces slightly and jerks her body away which only makes my fingertips drags along her skin.

"It burns!" she shouts as her body recoils.

"Where can I find more of your guild?" I ask.

"It burns, it burns! Stop!"

"Wrong answer, " I growl.

Placing my other hand just above the one embedded into her skin I pull with all my strength and rip apart the rest of her leg. She screams in pain and her body shakes involuntarily.

"I'm going to ask again," I say, "Where can we find more members of the Laughing Coffin?!"

"I'm not telling you anything!" she replies, clearly in agony.

"Wrong again!" I seethe.

This time I harshly turn her on her belly and dig my fingers into her back. Making sure I do so as slowly as possible I drag my hand down her back. The shining damage effect I leave across her back is almost blinding but at the same time satisfying.

I can hear how the girl bites down on her lips to not scream or complain. It's too obvious. She will be easy to break; I only regret I was not allowed to do this sooner.

"You can walk out of this," I say softly.

"Oh, that's a classic," Mirai chuckles.

"You just have to tell me what I want: where your friends are," we both say in synch.

"You are going to have to try harder!" she answers.

A soft laugh escapes my lips as I stand up. I raise my right leg a bit and start stepping in the girl's head. I drop my foot on the back of her head and the raise it back again to continue. One hit after another I feel my sole pushing her head into the ground.

"Come, on just tell us!" Esra interjects.

"Keep quiet," I snap at Esra.

She covers her mouth and no longer being able to look at the scene, her eyes start focusing on her on the floor.

"I will kill you if you don't answer me this time," I say.

"You won't kill me!" she says.

I place my left knee over her back and bring both of my hands to her neck. I dig both of my hands into her neck and slowly start pulling away in opposite directions.

"Last chance!" I yell.

I know the volume of my voice is quite loud but somehow her screaming overpowers my own. Not gauging my strength, I'm able to see for a split second how her head detaches from the base of her neck. Her body stops moving and seconds later her stiffened corpse disappears below me.

"Nice one," Mirai comments.

"Aeri…" Esra gasps.

"Shit…I…" I stammer and stand up.

I look down at my hands and deactivate bloodlust. I feel the gauntlets slowly retracting their reach over my body and in a small moment of panic I take things off, dropping them on the floor.

"I didn't mean to…" I mumble.

"We are lying again?" Mirai mutters.

I feel a horrible feeling coursing through my being, I wasn't careful enough; I really wasn't meaning to kill her. I was supposed to get information out of her. We no longer know or will have a chance of knowing of other Laughing Coffin operations. Dammit, I messed it up. I will have to contact Argo for new information, but even she is growing weary of me.

"What do we do now?" Esra asks.

I feel a little comfort in her use of the "we" pronoun. She might think I'm insane or just a murderous crazy girl but at the very least she is willing to stick along for a while longer.

Her question rolls around for more than a few seconds in my mind. What do we do now? We no longer have any valid sources of information and to hastily move and try to get another group from the Laughing Coffin might be very counterproductive.

"We have to tell Al about this…" I sigh and bring my menu down.

"Write a lovely message dear," Mirai says, "Be sure to include the part where you were able to see the floor below the broad as you disconnected her head from her body. I think that was the best part."

Moving over to messages tab I click the icon to start writing a new message when the bell indicating I have new mail rings loudly. A message from Asuna.

-From: Asuna  
-To: Aeri  
-Subject: Good news!  
-Message: I've passed along the last update on your Guild Member's level to the clearing parties. They are willing to have a meeting with your guild leader and someone he trusts (I assume that would be you). Oh right, some of them mentioned not being completely ok with the levels of the players you informed about, their names Sinna and Elina. So tell Alshep to get in contact with me and I'll give him the information about the meeting place. Bring your best attitude girlfriend; the leaders of both the Aincrad Liberation Force and even those guys from the DDA will be there.

I guess this is as good time as any; probably not the best of timing, but this will definitely get Al preoccupied on something else other than the fact that I killed our prisoner.

"We might have a spot with the clearing parties," I comment.

"I see, but what do we do about our current situation?" she asks.

"Dammit, I already told you, just tell Al, we'll figure things out later," I sigh, "…we have a floor to clear now."

* * *

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

Al's fist finds a quick way to the nearby wall, his hands shines slightly as he does so. As his closed hand makes contact with the surface a purple grid appears below it, stating the obvious fact that you can't hurt a building.

"God dammit Aeri," he remarks, "Why do you always have to take things over the line?"

"Master, if I may," Esra butts in, "I should've stopped it, I was the-"

"No!" Al fumes, "This was her fault."

I find myself holding my left arm, embracing myself at Al's harsh words. They are not misplaced, but I don't like it when he gets angry with me. I pout a little and refuse to look at him.

"Dammit," he says, "Answer this, did you mean to kill her?"

"I didn't mean to, I swear…" I answer softly.

"Well, let's agree to disagree on that," Mirai huffs.

"Alright…" he sighs, "What's done is done I guess…get ready then we need to leave soon for that meeting."

I nod at him and he promptly leaves my room along with his damned lap dog. Once Esra closes the door behind her I throw myself over my bed and press my face against the pillow. I scream with all my might into the fluffy object. My discomfort only becoming apparent as set of muffled sounds. I get a little too confortable in bed and managing to block out Mirai's presence. I find my way to a peaceful little nap. My eyes close down like heavy curtains and I start breathing in and out harmoniously.

My peace is interrupted as the door slams into my room. I jerk my body up and sit up, at my door stands Al, he doesn't have the happiest of faces. I probably slept for ten minutes or so.

"I told you to get ready," he scolds.

"I'm sorry," I whimper and stand up.

I take a few steps and he turns away to head for the stairs. I follow him, keeping a close distance but not as close as I would if we were not mad at me. We quietly make our way out of the house. Al just stops by the door to kiss Elina goodbye. I wave her goodbye and we step out into the crowded street. Al ignores me all the way to the teleport gate where he only turns my way in order to tell me the floor I need to teleport to.

"They said they wanted to meet in a restaurant in Coral," he says, "But you can't exactly be there, so I convinced them to change the location."

"Thanks…where are we going then?"

"We are going to a café in Starting City," he replies.

I sigh at his tone and let my shoulders droop a little. To think all of this could've been avoided, probably he wouldn't be mad then.

"Listen…I'm a bit mad that we lost our only possibly chance at some information…" he admits, "but Aeri…I'm more worried about you."

"Worried?"

"We'll discuss that later, we really should get going," he says and disappears from the teleport gate.

Using the menu I select the first floor and teleport myself to the main plaza of Starting City. The system sets me just a few feet away from Al who I can see heading to one of the side streets that draws a straight line to the center for the plaza. On a building not far from said street I can see a familiar figure.

A red and white uniformed figure takes a few steps forward and raising her hand in the air she starts to wave at us enthusiastically.

"You guys made it," Asuna exclaims.

I wave at her as well and trot a little to meet her. She hugs me briefly and shakes hands with Al. I find it a bit funny how stiff and proper they seem to be around each other.

"Everyone else is waiting, please come in," she says.

Taking us into the street she then makes a sharp right and pushes the door of a small establishment open. A small bell chimes as the door swings open and we make our way in.

"Welcome to Aria Café!" the NPC sings happily.

The place is completely empty except for a table right in the middle where three other players sit at. A woman with long silver hair, which she elegantly fixes into a ponytail, her face just screams seriousness and she seems to be one of those people that you can tell are smart by just looking at their expression. Next to her is a man with disheveled red hair, a weird bandana keeps it in place. He easily leans back to get a good look at us when he notices our arrival. He shoots a warm smile in our direction. Last in the table is a man with blue-ish hair and a sour expression, he seems annoyed as he sits with his arms crossed over his shiny silver armor.

"These are the people representing of the current clearing parties," Asuna says.

The woman with the beautiful hair stands up and makes a little bow at us. I react accordingly and level my head a little to return the gesture.

"My name is Yulier," she says, "I'm here representing the Aincrad Liberation Force, our leader Thinker could not make it, so apologies for the time being. For today I will speak on his behalf."

Al and I nod at the woman, once she is done introducing herself the man with red hair stands up from his seat. I can see clearly now that he wears a samurai-like armor, it must have some amazing attack buffs. He knocks his closed fist against his chest plate and smiles again.

"The name's Klein, I'm the leader of the guild called Fuurinkazan!" he announces proudly, "Nice to meet you."

The last man in the table sighs deeply and turns his gaze towards us. Unlike the people he shares the table with he refuses to stand up and merely gives us an annoyed look.

"My name is Lind, I'm here representing the Divine Dragon Alliance," he states.

"Would it kill him to be a little nicer?" I can hear Asuna mutter softly, "Well anyways! You know me, my name is Asuna and I will be representing the Knights of the Blood in this meeting. My guild leader has other matters to tend to, so I will tend to this one."

Al clears his throat and nods the players. We move over to take our seat in the table but before sitting down Al speaks.

"My name is Alshep, I'm the leader of Steel &amp; Swords, thank you all for having us here today," he says.

"My, my, our dear leader. So proper, so manly," Mirai purrs.

"This is my second in command," he continues and places his hand on my shoulder.

"I'm Aeri, thank you for having us," I say gently.

"Great, now that we are done with the middle school introductions can we get to business?" Lind huffs.

"Calm down, we have all the time in the world," Klein says.

Lind chuckles at Klein's words as we take a seat. He smugly grins at the red haired player and then exaggeratedly shakes his head at him.

"I don't know how the Fuurinwhatever like to invest their time in, but the DDA likes to invest it's time in things that actually matter," he says.

"Bite me! Your guild is nothing but a band of psychos out for items!" Klein yells, "Should I remind you your guild viscously attacked mine just to try and get one of those?"

"The DDA is a large guild, many sub-leaders take small groups of men and lead them on their own accord," Lind says, trying to excuse himself.

"You were there!" Klein spits back.

"Gentlemen, let's keep this meeting civil," Yulier proposes, "We are not here to discuss our guild's previous actions. We are here to talk about whether or not we let Steel &amp; Swords join the frontlines."

"Thank you, Julier…" Asuna sighs in relief, "I know all of our guilds have their differences but as Julier already said, we are not here to discuss that today."

"Right, I'm sorry," Klein says.

"Whatever…" Lind mutters.

"First and foremost I think we should explain why we've called you into gathering," Yulier says, "The front liners really don't have any say on who participates on the boss battles or not. However, security has been a growing concern recently and we at the very least feel a need to regulate what kind of people join us in these battles."

"Strategies are a must if you want to survives bosses and most people that just join into the battle without talking to us tend to do whatever they want and not follow our instructions," Klein adds, "By no means do we want to boss people around, but having players disrupting our tactics and mindlessly throwing themselves into danger is something we want to avoid."

"Well said," Asuna comments with a smile, "We have strategy meetings every now and then, the attendants are comprised of every guild that wishes to participate in the boss battle, that way everyone fighting is informed and thus chaos is less likely to arise once the attempt begins."

"If you are to join us in the front lines, your guild will have to constantly train and try to keep their levels as high as the front liners," Yulier continues, "It's no easy task but it's also not an impossible one."

"That's what leads us to our first topic of discussion here…" Lind mutters, "According to the information you've given us you have two guild members that are somewhat low leveled."

"We do, I suspect you wouldn't like these members participating in the boss battles?" Al asks.

"Correct, until they are a higher level and you as a guild leader deem they would be of use in combat," Yulier says, "We wouldn't want any players to die just because they weren't ready."

"That makes sense…" I mumble.

"I understand," Al says.

Lind stands up with a rather big grin on his face and Yulier's, Klein's and Asuna's expressions suddenly change into ones of annoyance.

"Jumping into topic number two," the man says, "Alshep, leader of Steel &amp; Swords, care to tell us why someone such as yourself, with intentions as pure as you allegedly present. A guild with the goal of helping peop-"

"I don't like when people dancing around a point," Al bitterly interrupts him.

The man pauses and gives Al an even wider shit-eating grin.

"Why is your second in command a red player?"

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Update: 08/12/2015 - This chapter is now beta read by DragonofAnnoth!

How are you all doing? Aeri is going to a rougher patch lately and things are going from dark to absolutely grim if you ask me. As I said this will be a much darker arc and I think just by reading the last few chapters you can realize this. Either way, I apologize if this feels short or something but I'm just pacing myself. I'm very glad and surprised to see a couple of new follows and favorites this week. Waking up to the email notifications of people liking my story truly puts a smile in my face. My beta-reader is having a bit of a heavy month so I will be applying his revisions during the week as I did with the last one. (I like to think I've reduced silly mistakes with this chapter haha) There is no extra chapter this week again as I think I don't want to add anything else to this chapter, but next week do expect one.

**devilparrot: **Glad to se eyou are still around! Thank you so much for your support! **IC0: **Does this tickle your sadistic side? Haha I'm kidding but I figure this at least scratches that itch of yours with the last chapter.

As always, if you like what you read, please a review, I always enjoy reading what people have to say about my story be it good or bad. I will see you all next week! Also no teasers this week!


	52. Chapter 52 - Smoke and Mirrors

**Chapter 52.- Smoke and Mirrors**

**January/16th/2024**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Starting City – Aria Café**

**Alshep**

I have never enjoyed debating or talking to people I don't know for that matter. We had debates from time to time at school but it was just something our teacher made us do somewhat often. It was odd though; never in my life did I hear anyone else talking about their debates in class. I guess my homeroom teacher just had a thing for those. She said it encouraged our critical thinking and made it so we had better and more informed opinions. In the end it was just shouting at other people in order to get your point across. That's debate in a nutshell, technically. Although I guess it does require finesse, but at the end of the day it's just trying to impose your opinion in other people. Sadly I've never been known for finesse.

"I asked you question," Lind presses.

"Because she is capable," I answer.

Lind rolls his eyes at me and then sits back down. He sighs out in annoyance and crosses his arms.

"Allow me to rephrase that question," he says.

"By all means," I answer, trying to get a hold of my tone.

"Why is she a red player?" he asks.

I turn my head just for a second to get a read on Aeri, she is staring the man right in the eye. The following will probably take everyone in the room by surprise but I'm pretty sure I will be able to turn the situation into our favor.

"She is a player killer," I answer.

I can almost immediately feel the mood of the room tense up.

"A…Al!" Aeri yelps.

"Yoh, what the hell?!" Klein exclaims, "You can't be for real…"

My response seems to have shaken up the samurai a little bit, given that he practically jumps up from his seat as he expresses his disapproval.

I can see Asuna giving me a lovely stare, that of disapproval with some heavy anger on the side. I guess at least she knows. However the other galore of faces in this rather small table is one I didn't actually expect.

Yulier simply nods right at me as if expecting a follow up on my statement, one I have planned but I certainly didn't expect this acceptance from the players that have been risking their lives in order to clear the game. On the other hand, Lind looks disappointed at Yulier's response. Nonetheless he wastes no time in opening his mouth.

"You see! I knew something was off about this guild!" he yells.

Klein nods, although he seems hesitant, no later than a second he shakes his head at us.

"Excuse me for my reaction, you can't really judge me for reacting like that though…" he says, "Player killers aren't exactly friendly to us clearers."

"She is not what you think though!" Asuna interjects, "She doesn't do that anymore, it was just that one time, right?"

Asuna turns to Aeri expecting an answer that I know in the bottom of my being to be a lie. This is probably the one time that I would beg Aeri to lie, I just hope she is not in the mood to tell her sins to a bunch of strangers.

"Yeah!" Aeri replies, "I was given no choice!"

Klein seems to relax at both Asuna's trust on Aeri and her own quick response on the matter. However he still feels somewhat weary of us as he is yet to sit down again and put his hand elsewhere other than the pummel of his sword.

"Ok, so she killed someone…" Klein mutters, "It was probably in self-defense, right?"

"Not necessarily," I reply.

"I knew it!" Lind says, "These people cannot be trusted!"

"Yeah man, I'm sorry but you just keep making this sound fishier by the second," Klein says.

Yulier leans a bit forward, her face screams intrigue. I'm playing this whole damned scenario too fast and loose. So far everyone seems eager to jump the gun, however they still seem like they want to listen to us. They want us to give them a reason to trust us.

"I believe you should explain this…situation a bit better," Yulier suggests.

The woman intertwines her fingers as she rests her elbows over the table. A more than serious attitude emanates from her and leaves me feeling like I'm walking through some thin ice. I take another glance at Aeri, there's probably just one other time where I can place her face looking as displeased as she looks right now. This has to be done; I just hope it turns out how I've been thinking it will.

"Almost a year ago we were attacked by a guild, they used to call themselves The White Snakes," I explain, "They killed two members of my guild and left us with no choice other than to defend ourselves."

"Bullshit!" Lind interrupts me, "If that were the case she wouldn't have a red cursor! She must have attacked first!"

"Sit down, Lind," Yulier orders with a firm tone, "Let the man explain what happened, this time wait for him to be done speaking."

"Yeah, let him explain!" Klein adds.

Lind once again finds the rug pulled from under his feet and sits back down as Yulier ordered him to.

"The Snakes had a green player that they hired infiltrate our guild. This player, who we thought to be a friend betrayed us," I say, "We were pushed to the edge, as I said, leaving us with no other choice than to defend ourselves. Aeri decided to take the first step in this action, and she attacked first. She killed the green player who betrayed us."

I make a brief pause to both collect my thoughts and get another read on the room. Aeri has decided to stare at her own lap as she finds herself unable to look at these people in the eye. Asuna on the other side is showing that sympathetic side of hers. I'm assuming the Knight of the Blood already knows this story from Aeri's point of view and if something is testament to that is the fact that she now places her hand over Aeri's shoulder, trying to give her some solace.

"Ok…" Klein mumbles, "I'm sorry for misjudging you."

"It's alright; I can't really blame you, now can I?" Aeri mutters.

"It's just that I've lost a few people to player killers too," Klein explains, "I'm sorry, I truly am."

"Desperate times call for desperate measures," Yulier comments, "If we take this story of yours as the truth it's hard to hold anything against her or your guild."

"That's IF we take your story as the truth," Lind remarks.

"I like it how the man with the most red players in his guild here is the one pointing fingers," Klein mutters.

"Oh, shut up you samurai wannabe!" Lind barks, "I do what's necessary to push the guild forwards, unlike you three! We live in a dog eat dog world, it baffles me how none of you have realized that yet!"

"We have, we just draw the conclusion that hurting others to get ahead is wrong!" Asuna intervenes.

"The DDA doesn't kill players!" Lind huffs.

"Yeah but you bastards steal and attack other players in order to get what you want!" Klein spits.

"Enough!" Yulier raises her voice, "I'll remind you once more, this is not the reason why we are here today. We'll have enough time to point fingers and scream at each other later!"

Again and as it should be the eldest from the group of people at this table takes action and manages to get everyone back at the task at hand. I can't help but to wander what kind of person she was back in the real world. If she was anyone's boss I bet she was one hell of a person to work with. Of course I mean that in the good way.

"I'm sorry…" Klein coughs and clears his through, "I think I heard of these White Snakes back in the day. Players that dressed all in white, they killed, kidnapped and mugged people all around different floors, right?"

"They sound an awful lot like those new players from the Laughing Coffin," Yulier mutters, "Ok, now that we have this issue about the girl being a red player out of the way let's discuss why we are really here."

"Yeah…sure, if you all don't mind having a killer working with us…" Lind comments.

"Oh bite me!" Aeri snaps, "I'm sick and tired of people like you giving me shit! You think you are all high and mighty for having a different color on your damn cursor."

"Heh, I like this girl," Klein mutters with a soft laugh.

Right after Klein's comment Asuna slams the table with her hands, seemingly mad at the Lind's attitude. She stands up and with a face scarier than that of Aeri's when she angry and starts speaking.

"I would like to see you show half the skill and guts to do what this "killer" as you call her has done!" Asuna miffs, "She was the reason we were able to clear floor forty eight!"

"What? I thought that floor was cleared by The Aincrad Liberation Force," Lind says.

Aeri crosses her arms and smiles smugly at the leader of the DDA.

"So that's what they are telling, huh?"

"Care to explain that, Yulier?" Lind demands.

"Some members of our guild thought it was a good idea to trick red players into clearing the floor for us, while offering a sketchy incentive in return." Yulier says, "Most of the guild voted against it; however a few individuals still carried out the nasty little plan on their own. Whoever participated on that scam is now in a jail cell, there is no need to worry or point more fingers. Asuna did report this red player in particular to be of substantial help, I can know assume that player is her."

Asuna grins with a wide, open smile and stares down the leader of the DDA.

"Now, let's just get down to the voting," Asuna suggests.

"Alright, I can agree with that," Klein says, "I think I've heard enough."

"All in favor of allowing Steel &amp; Swords to join the frontlines say aye," Yulier says.

"Aye!" Klein huffs.

"Aye," Asuna follows.

"Aye," Yulier says.

Yulier turns her head towards Lind and shoots the poor man a smug grin. Lind sighs and raises his hand.

"Aye," he agrees.

"Alright, I believe there is nothing else to address for now," Yulier says satisfied and stands up, "The next clearer meeting will not take place anytime soon, I'll be sure to keep you posted."

Through her menu she sends me a friend request. The floating screen appears before me and without hesitation I press the circle to accept her friend request. Klein stands up as well and stretches his arms up.

"I guess it doesn't hurt to keep everyone on the loop," he says and also sends me a friend request, "I'm sure we'll see more of each other in the future."

With a warm smile he leaves the small café, his heavy armor clanking as he walks. I accept his request and Lind stands up.

"I have no need for that, if I ever do need you in my friends list it will be when it actually matters," he says.

"Likewise," I smile.

"Heh, whatever," he huffs.

The man from the DDA leaves the place leaving us with Yulier and Asuna still at the table. Yulier breathes out heavily, a sign of tiredness for sure. However it feels rather heavy, as if it were convoluted with more than a healthy serving of annoyance.

"I will never understand the DDA," she sighs.

"They are an odd bunch, but definitely useful," Asuna comments.

"Useful…" Yulier ponders, "One would think that in a situation where we would benefit the most out of working together we would've created one guild to clear floors. However we find ourselves divided. Isn't it just…strange?"

"Would you really be ok, working with someone like that?" Aeri asks.

"I wouldn't exactly love it, but…" she says, "I just find it weird. You have the KoB, DDA, Fuurinkazan and the Aincrad Liberation Force…why are we all separated? We are working towards the same goals after all…aren't we?"

"The one difference here is our methods, and it also happens in human history, all across the ages. Ideologies and ways of life clash, generating differences. I think it's no different here," Asuna comments, "We are fighting a war after all, even if some decide to better allocate their time in hindering our progress or hurting one another, we do our best to save everyone."

"I guess you are right," Yulier agrees.

Asuna slowly rises from her seat and places her hand over the pummel of her sword.

"I'm needed elsewhere," she says, "It's a good thing we got this sorted out."

"I'll see you later Asuna," Aeri mumbles.

"You two take care," the knight says with a smile.

"We'll try our best," I answer.

Asuna walks away from the table and pushes the door of the café in order to make her exit. I lean over a little resting my weight under my arms. Yulier still looks deep in thought, she raises a good point, but Asuna does the same.

"I think you are both right," I comment.

"Huh?" Yulier exclaims.

"The points you two raise are equally right or at least I think so," I explain.

"Care to elaborate on that?"

"Our history as human beings has always and will forever be plagued with conflict. A time in the human history where we really have been free of it is rare, if not nonexistent," I say, "I think that's why Utopias in books, movies and comics seem so rare to us. You know as if something about them was…off. I'm not saying we need this conflict, but…wouldn't it be weird if there was just one guild clearing this game?"

"You are not wrong," she says and leaves her seat, "I think I just wish there was a simpler…more peaceful way to get this sorted out. I'll stop bothering you; I also have other matters to attend to."

The woman starts making her way to the exit but stops a few feet from the door. She turns her head to me and smiles.

"I look forward to seeing your guild in the frontlines," she says.

"We'll be there," I reply.

I breathe in slowly and then push the air out through my nose. I feel satisfied and fulfilled with whatever was the point of this meeting. I quickly tap my fingers over the table and then raise my hand towards the NPC taking care of the place.

"Hey could your bri-"

My head is swiftly turned a few degrees as Aeri slaps me across the face.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" Aeri says as she takes a hold of my shirt's collar.

"What?"

"Don't just put me out there like that!" she cries, "Why the hell would you do that? Why did you have to tell them about what happened?!"

Aeri is upset, to the point that she is softly sobbing. It's not a pleasant memory for sure but I guess she is still not completely over it. Not like I am, but I guess she is in a far more sensitive spot than I am right now.

"I'm sorry," I mutter.

"You just…don't do that…" she weeps and rests her head on my shoulder.

I wrap my arms around her and pat her back gently. I keep forgetting there is still a girl who lost her boyfriend under this seasoned golden armor of hers. She is still hurting and she's been merely finding ways to avoid facing what happened that day.

"I'm sorry," I say again.

* * *

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

"Al…"

I can see them, their faces and that last look of panic burned into their expressions as I killed them. It's haunting me; I can't get it out of my head.

"Al,"

It's all I see when I try to sleep, their god dammed faces.

"Al!"

I sit up quickly as I find myself out of breath. I heave uncontrollably as I start feeling my body drenched in cold sweat. Elina looks at me; she's worried, that much is clear as she approaches me from her side of the bed. On her knees she takes hold of my head and holds it close to her chest as I'm still struggling to regulate my own breathing.

"You were dreaming again," she says softly, "It's ok, I'm here now."

My trembling arms slowly embrace her and I can't help but pull myself closer to her. I manage to make my breathing purely nasal but ultimately that only makes it sound like I'm struggling even more to slow it down.

"You've been having a lot of nightmares lately…" she murmurs.

"I'm sorry," I answer.

"You don't have to apologize," she says, "I just wish I could do something."

I feel her hand slide down over my arm and take hold of my own. She squeezes it tightly and softly rubs her thumb over it.

"You are helping enough as it is," I say, "Just stay here with me…"

She can't do much and even if I keep telling her she can help me that would be a lie. After all I'm not planning on telling her about what I've been doing with Esra and Aeri anytime soon.

"Hey, what if you tell me, what the nightmare was about?" she suggests.

Lying to her has sadly become a regular thing, it tears me up inside.

"I don't remember," I answer quickly.

"Come on, you must remember something," she insists.

I've done a lot of bad things in my time here. I've been an asshole, I've put people in risk, but nothing makes me feel nearly as bad as lying to Elina. She is the one person who completely trusts me, the one person who trusts me blindly. My girlfriend, probably the one person I care the most about before myself and I'm lying to her. The only way I could feel like a shittier person would be if Esra's assumptions about me and Aeri were true.

"I just keep thinking about the past," I mutter, "The things I've done wrong, the things I could fix…the future just seems dark and blurry. I'm scared."

I try to concentrate on her breathing, her chest slowly taking in air and letting it out. Her warmth, I try to put my mind into it, how safe it makes me feel.

"We are all scared," she says, "Everyone undergoing training has said so. Fighting bosses shouldn't be taken lightly, it's normal for you to feel scared."

After her words I take a minute or two to collect my thoughts, to try and figure out what I'm going to say next. I'm unable to reach a conclusion and I just stay silent for more than a minute. In the silence of our room and the fact that my ear is practically pressed against her chest I can hear her heartbeat speed up a little.

"Remember what you promised me?" she says shyly, "Like back at the beginning?"

"Of course I do," I answer.

"What was it?" she teases.

"You know, what I said," I mutter, avoiding her objective.

She let's go off me for a second and I'm finally able to look at her. I'm able to see her rosy cheeks thanks to the moonlight slipping in to our room. Her eyes purely fixated on mine as she is anxiously waiting for my answer.

"Come on," she giggles.

I chuckle a bit and clear my throat.

"I promised you, you would see the end of this game," I say softly.

She nods with a rather big smile and leans in to kiss me. I hold her close and kiss her back, honestly feeling a bit embarrassed that she managed to force me into it but I enjoy it nonetheless. She backs away and then rests her head next to mine.

"See, it's ok silly, maybe you are just worrying a lot," she says, "With the news from the clearers and all the work and stress you've been putting yourself under, you must be under a lot of pressure."

And I keep lying.

"It must be that…yeah," I mumble.

What makes me feel even worse is that I have a feeling that she knows. I have the feeling right in the back of my head that she knows that I'm lying to her.

* * *

Crysina here! I'm so sorry!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Lies, lies, lies! This is something I've been wanting to explore for a while with my characters. Trust me I know most of my fic revolves around character interactions and such but I've never really delved into the nasty stuff about relationships, which I will really explore further down the line.

I know what you are thinking. "This chapter is too short!" Well I hear you say that and I'm here to actually say that the original version was shorter, and after all as I said, I'm trying to pace myself with plot points for this penultimate arc. Nevertheless I hope you enjoyed it given I advance quite a few things even if it really doesn't seem like so.

Again I'm ever so sorry about the mishap earlier this day, it will not happen! I give my thanks to a friend of mine who helped me rewrite this whole chapter by saying I was a dumbass and constantly badgering over Skype.

As always, if you like what you read, leave a review! Or also if you don't like what you read you should also leave a review! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Lies Among Friends"


	53. Chapter 53 - Lies Among Friends

**Chapter 53.- Lies Among Friends**

**January/23rd/2024**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

**Ruri**

"I just think it's weird," I mutter and cross my legs.

"Come on, she is allowed to have a life outside this house," Kayla answers.

I place my elbow over the arm rest of the chair and continue to stare at Kayla who is by some act of god letting me watch as she tries on clothes. Not that I mind, I am very much enjoying myself watching her strip in and out of clothing. I just never figured she would enjoy trying clothes for me. After all, I did ask, I just never expected her to agree to my request.

I rest my head on the top of my palm and lean in ever so slightly to right to see if I can get a better angle. She is finally able to pull up a pair of somewhat tight gray pants and buttons the front rather quickly. She twirls a bit on one foot and looks at herself in the mirror. She pulls a little on the oversized white sweater she is wearing and purses her lips.

"What do you think?" she asks.

My gaze lingers on her, however I stay silent. Honestly I would want to see some more skin but it's not a bad fit. She looks particularly cute in the oversized sweater. She turns to me and hides her own hands inside the sleeves. She points at me with her right arm and sticks her hip out to the side.

"Left you speechless?" she chuckles.

"I like it," I say with a smile, "But…"

"I could show a little more skin?" she interrupts with a blank stare.

I nod at her and uncross my legs.

"You've said the same thing about the last five outfits I've tried on!" she complains.

"Hey, it's not my fault you decided to start with the bikini you want to use next week at the lake," I reply.

She blushes slightly and coughs to try and hide it.

"I guess you make a fair point…" she mumbles.

She grabs the bottom of her sweater and starts pulling it over her head and once I start seeing her smooth stomach I find myself in some sort of trance. God why did you make me weak to the female body?! She stops halfway and quickly pushes what she was pulling back down.

"Enough of the peepshow you perv," she says and sticks her tongue out.

She pulls down her menu and changes into her regular, boring battledress through the menu commands. Light envelops her lovely figure and the battledress makes itself present. I pout and lean back on the chair. You just don't tease someone like this, it isn't fair. I jerk myself forwards and pat the side of my head.

"Wait! I was talking about something that wasn't how much skin you were showing…" I say, "I think…"

"Yeah you were talking about Esra," Kayla says.

"Yes, I was!" I say, jumping out from my seat, "Something's totally fishy there!"

My beautiful girlfriend sighs out loudly and crosses her arms as she strike that pose I adore. Cold eyes, she tilts her head a little to the right and gives me a half grin.

"Come on, leave her alone," she says.

"I'm so curious though!" I exclaim, "She almost never leaves the house, no matter what and now she tries like super hard to find time and sneak out. Wait! Do you think she has a boyfriend?!"

"I don't know," she replies uninterested.

"Or better yet! A girlfriend?"

"Better yet?" she says sounding a bit irked.

It's really odd for me to grow so curious, but lately with the constant, tiring sessions of training leave me with a lot of time to observe people, which I rarely do. Well I will admit I like observing people but normally it's not curiosity that draws me to sneak a peek when Aereth is sunbathing or when Kayla is taking a bath.

"I didn't mean it like that…" I excuse myself, "Don't you want to know why she is sneaking out?"

"Not really," she says, "I really could not be less interested."

"That's kind of harsh."

She sits on our bed and lies down on her back.

"I didn't mean for it to sound mean or anything…" she sighs, "I just wish you were just thin-"

She stops herself and rolls to the left, leaving me unable to see anything other than her back.

"You just wish what?" I ask as I get closer.

"Nothing, forget it," she says shyly.

I grin widely and sit just next to her. I place my right hand on her left calf and pull on her a little to make her face my way. She resists and stays completely still facing away from me. Little Miss Princess is being shy about something, just when I'm saying out loud that I'm particularly curious. It's really not smart to start behaving like this.

"Come on baby, what is it?" I say with a bit of a teasing tone.

"Ugh, don't call me that…" she mumbles.

"Honey?" I tease as I lay down next to her.

"Stop," she says, trying hard not to laugh.

I'm quite skilled at getting my dear Kayla to talk, it requires a whole lot of making her feel embarrassed. Some sweet talking might be involved but it all really depends on the eye contact.

I reach for her arm and pull her somewhat harshly. My struggle merely manages to roll her on her back but I take the opportunity and pull myself over her. I straddle her quickly and with both of my legs holding her figure in place I can't help but to chuckle. I grab both of her arms and slowly slide my hands to meet hers. I squeeze tightly once I get a hold of her hands and laugh once more. Making sure to make her feel as vulnerable as possible I keep her arms over her head and as spread out as I'm able. She blushes hard but avoids my eyes at all costs.

"Come on," I purr, "tell me."

"Just forget it," she replies with a squeaky.

She quickly coughs on purpose yet again and struggles to get out of my grip. She could easily push me away, yet she pretends to be weak.

"Just get off of me!" she growls.

I lower my head and make the tip of my nose meet her own cute little nose. I chuckle and also rest my forehead against hers. Now she has no excuse to not stare into my eyes.

"Tell. Me," I whisper.

"I just…" she squeaks.

It's really amazing how much she changes when she is alone with me, at first she tried really hard to keep her tough attitude around me but she slowly lowered her guard and now she is the cutest thing I've ever laid eyes on. However if you were to catch her outside this very room she will try her hardest to be all tough.

"I just wish you didn't think of other girls when you are with me…" she confesses.

If there has ever been a moment in life when you can use the phrase "it just melts me heart" it wouldn't even compare to this right here. I feel a great urge to just lose any coherence and exclaim a long and drawn out "aww" but since I'm on top I need to pull some composure.

"You know I only think about you," I mutter and move my head to kiss her soft pink-ish lips.

She moves her head away and I just pout at her.

"I mean it…" she says, "I know you are silly, you like being silly, but I…you are my first well…"

She grows silent again and again a dumb little laugh escapes my lips.

"Don't laugh!" she yells.

"Come on you can't expect me to believe I'm your first relationship."

She turns her head towards the window and with her cheeks filled with air she stares into the distance.

"Oh my god, I am," I say, feeling a bit shocked, "Freaking why? You are stupid levels of pretty."

"You are like the only person to ever say they like me like that," she says softly.

I feel myself blush a little, I enjoy seeing her embarrassed and making her feel vulnerable but this is above and beyond anything I ever expected.

"Hey, stop staring like that, even your pervy look is better than that," she says.

"So am I doing well for a first girlfriend?" I ask.

"Y-yeah…" she answers, blushing even harder than before.

"Oh my god, I could just eat you up right now," I squeal.

"Well…" she says, "Why don't you?"

* * *

I'm a lucky girl, more often than not I find myself thinking so. I mean, I can't really complain and even if I tried my hardest I would find it hard to. Beautiful girlfriend, great friends, I'm really living the dream.

I stretch my right arm until I hear it crack and then sigh out in relief. I rotate my wrist a bit and then lean back on the headboard of our bed.

"So hey, want to go out and have dinner?" I ask.

I look over to my left and see Kayla already soundly sleeping. Really now? She must be kidding.

"Hey?" I exclaim, "You awake?"

I lean a bit over her and see her face. Eyes closed, her lips only slightly apart as she breathes in and out through her mouth. I smile and kiss her cheek. I slide myself over to the edge of the bed and stand up. I make my way to the door as I pick up my clothes and open the door. I walk out into the hallway and start dressing myself there.

"Is this like a regular thing you do? Just dress up in the hallway?"

I turn my head to the side and see Billfray coming out of his room.

"Do you like stare at half naked girls? Is that regular thing you do?" I joke.

"You are an odd one," he says as he walks past me.

"Your hair color is odd!" I yell

"It's almost the same color as yours!" he yells back.

"Mine looks cooler though!"

He casually goes down the stairs and I lose sight of him as soon as he is down just a few steps. I finish dressing up myself and take a few steps to look over the foyer. Billfray exits the building, probably off to drink or do some afternoon hunting. Esra comes into view and I duck immediately, for some reason my dumb brain thinks the balusters are enough to hide my presence.

Maid extraordinaire however seems oblivious to my existence and even though she checks around the foyer for someone she fails to see me and exits the building. Well what better time than right now? I vault myself over the railing and swiftly land on the floor below. I hustle over to the door but hesitate to open it as I peek out the main window in the foyer. Her frilly dress swings from side to side as she tries to make her way through the sea of NPCs that crowd this little city.

"Alright, let's go into super stealthy mode," I mumble to myself.

I drag down my menu and equip an overly fancy and pompous dress. No one expects me to dress like it's the perfect cover. I even have a cartoonish looking folding fan to go along with it. I whip it out from the side of the dress and spread it out close to my mouth as I laugh with an exaggerated tone.

"What are you doing?" I hear behind me.

Freezing I turn around in an almost robotic manner and see Aereth standing next to the set of stairs.

"Ohoho," I continue for some dumb reason, "I'm just going out to catch dinner, darling."

"Ok…" he mumbles, yet his gaze stays on me for a few seconds, "whatever…"

Not even waiting for him to leave I open the door and exit the guild house. I push a couple of NPCs as I stumble out into the street, as some kind of reflex I say sorry even though I'm fully aware that they really don't care for my actions towards them. Being careful of my step I swerve around the crowd, doing my very best to keep Esra's frilly red outfit in sight. She is walking fast, if it were any other person you would just assume they are in a hurry but it's not like Esra to push NPCs around. If someone knows how to properly traverse these streets it's her so something definitely is up with her attitude.

I follow her all the way to the teleport gate located on the very center of Barrowdell. Knowing that I might lose her at any second I jump above the crowd and land but a few feet away from my maid friend. She doesn't seem to notice me so I stand on my tiptoes and make an inhuman attempt to peek at what floor she is selecting in the gate's menu. She selects floor twenty eight and disappears quickly. I bring up the gate's menu and wait a few seconds to select the same floor. I finally press the floating button and find myself in the small town that serves as the main settlement for floor twenty eight.

As soon as the light from the teleportation stops blinding me I can see Esra running towards one of the small building not far from the teleport gate itself. It seems to be some kind of inn or restaurant. Now it's official she is definitely meeting up with someone. It seems I'll have first-hand at judging whoever is trying to woo my cute house maid. Seeing her enter the building I ease up a little and walk slowly towards the door. I manage to catch the attention of some players as I walk there and little smile takes over my lips. Come on boys I know I look good.

I'm about to rest my hand against the door when a players steps in from the side. My eyes widen in surprise as I notice who the player and in a fit of panic I take a few steps away and try to hide my face with my fan.

"Excuse me," Al says as he pushes the door in.

He doesn't even bother to take a look at me he just simply walks in and slams the door shut behind him. My thirst for knowledge just grows stronger by the minute. Feeling a bit uneasy I push the door in and quickly notice Esra and Al sitting at a table not far from the bar, still shielding my face I gracefully walk over to the bar. I take a sit at one of the high chairs and rest my arms over the bar.

"Can I offer you anything?" the bar maiden asks.

"Just some ale please," I mumble.

I can hear the girl grab a mug from under the counter and fill it to the brim with ale. She sets it close to my right hand and I can't help but to feel she is staring.

"That's a pretty dress to be bar hopping," she says.

"Oh, you are not an NPC," I say surprised.

"Hah, I'm not," she says, "A lot of players still confuse me with one though. So what brings you here? And why are you dressed like that?"

If my long history of taking cabs and that one time I went to a bar with my cousins to get totally smashed leave me with something is that strangers that you are never ever going get to see in your life again provide the most helpful of insights.

"To be honest I'm like spying on a couple of friends," I say as I take my mug into my hands.

I take a quick sip while turning my head a bit, in the corner of my eye I'm able to Al and Esra talking about something. The argument seems quite heated as Al isn't exactly smiling and he has slammed his fist against the table a couple of times.

"Ah, interesting," the girl says and leans a little over the bar, "Who exactly? Maybe I can help."

I take a good long sip of my cold beverage and slowly set the mug over the smooth wooden bar.

"The maid over there and that grumpy guy," I say while tilting my head.

"You don't say?" she says, "I've seen the maid a couple of times now."

"Really?"

"Yeah, she comes by with this other girl and they rent out a room for a few hours," she explains, "Never seen the guy though."

I tilt my head like a confused puppy as I try to really understand what this girl just said.

"She…rents out a room with another girl?" I ask.

"Yeah, actually, there she is, the other girl," she says and point at the door with her finger.

I turn around in my seat and see Aeri coming into the inn. She scans the room and after locating Al and Esra she sighs before walking over to them.

"Wait, what the hell do they do in the room?" I anxiously ask, turning my body around in one ungraceful swing.

"Hey, that's none of my business, you can do whatever you want in the rooms as long as you pay," she says, "The last few times I've seen them here they rent out the same room though."

"Do you have an extra key?!"

The girl crosses her arms and stares at me judgingly.

"Just what are you suggesting?" she plays dumbs.

"I'll pay you for a spare as long as you send them to the same room," I answer quickly.

"Woah, you must be a special kind of perv."

"Whatever, you want col or not?" I pressure.

She looks around a bit nervously but then leans in close to my face.

"Ok but you pay me three days rent," she says.

"How much is that?" I ask.

"Uhm, let's see," she ponders, "Around eight thousand."

"What the hell? Do you leave mints under the pillows or does the room come with a butler?" I complain.

She gives me a wide smirk and leans in closer.

"Eight thousand," she repeats.

"Six," I barter.

"Seven," she replies.

"Dammit…" I whine, "Fine."

I transfer the greedy player her col and she gives me a small key. I chug what ale is left in my mug and place it over the bar.

"Third door to the right down the hall, have fun," the girl says.

"We'll see about that," I say and stick my tongue out to her.

Shielding my face once more I walk somewhat close to Al's, Esra's and Aeri's table as they are in the way to reach the hallways where rooms are. I count the doors on the right side and stop next to the third. I try the key on it and it opens up. I push the door in and close it behind me. I make sure to lock it and look around the small room. There's a very basic table in the middle with three chairs surrounding it. A two door closet, a small door I can only assume leads to the bathroom to the right. I scan around the room and notice a surprisingly small bed against the wall and absolutely no windows, feeling rather confused I keep looking around while raising an eyebrow.

"What the hell is there even to do here?" I ask myself.

I drag down my menu and switch back into my usual clothes. The ones Ashley made for me, the so called armored clothes. I start looking around, trying to look for clues, or just really anything these guys could have to do in here. I'm not leaving sex out of the equation but it just doesn't seem like them, they must be up to something else. I'm literally looking under the pillow for mints when I hear the lock on the door jiggle a bit.

"Turn the key the other way, idiot," Aeri's voice pierces through the door.

"Calm down," Al says, "Geez…besides you don't get to be angry at me!"

In my tiptoes I make my way to the closet and open it quickly. Seeing it's empty I walk inside and find myself pulling the door shut as the main door to the room opens. I leave the door open just a tiny bit so I'm able to peek outside.

Aeri comes into the room followed by Al and Esra. Esra seems to be sulking as she walks behind her master ever so diligently. Al shuts the door as the three of them make it inside and sighs out in just sheer annoyance.

"How long has this been going on?" he asks.

"Relax, we've only met up with her three times," Aeri says.

"Relax?" Al says annoyed, I believe I told you if we were to do this bullshit together we would need to be honest with each other."

"Master if I may…" Esra butts in.

"Hang on!" Al says harshly and returns to Aeri, "I don't like finding out about stuff this way!"

"Hey, it's not my fault you practically choked her to death the last time you met up with her, I think it's only natural she doesn't want to see you," Aeri says as she sit on the edge of the bed, "Felt appropriate to keep it from you, besides who told you to sneak around and follow Esra today?"

"That's not the point dammit!" Al says enraged, "If you want this thing to work, you have to stop keeping things from me!"

"Christ, shut up you two!" Esra yells.

Both Al and Aeri turn to the maid looking quite surprised. Esra quickly realizes her actions and makes a perfect angle as she bows at both of them.

"I'm sorry!" she squeals and then stands up straight, "You two have to stop fighting though, we are not going to get anywhere if you guys keep fighting over every little thing!"

"She is right…" Aeri weasels out.

"Yeah, we'll talk about this later," Al complains, "When is she coming over?"

"Just give her a few minutes, she'll get here soon," Aeri says, "Can't say she'll be happy to see you though."

Just what in the hell are they talking about? My mind tries to conjure up just whatever they might be discussing but I just can't come up with anything. Whatever it is apparently there is a fourth person involved…one who Al once almost choked to death.

A knock on the door of the room makes me jump a bit, not really minding the head room I hit myself with the pole in which you would usually hang stuff. I make myself really aware of the noise I made and stand back, fearing I might've been discovered. I stare at the back of the door, scared of peeking out when I hear another voice, another girl.

"Ok, let's do this quickly; I don't have a lot of ti-"she stops herself, "What the hell is he doing here?"

"Miss Argo, we can explain," Esra says.

"Explain whatever you want, I'm leaving," this Argo individual replies.

"Argo come on, can't you guys just get over it?" Aeri says, "I'm sure Al here is very sorry."

I lean a little to the left to see if I can take a peek but all I see is the back of Esra's uniform she seems to be leaning against the closet doors.

"You see the thing is that I don't doubt he is sorry," Argo says, "That much I can see, what bothers me is that he doesn't regret what he did that day!"

A long drawn out silence dominates the room for a few seconds before Al answers.

"I did what I had to do…" he mutters.

"See!" Argo yell, "I'll meet you two and only you two somewhere else, I don't want to see his face ever again!"

"Miss Argo, please reconsider!" Esra pleads.

I hear hurried steps across the room followed by a door slamming shut with a lot of force.

"Let me through Aeri," Argo says.

"No, you give us our info and then you can go." Aeri says, "I won't let your stupid issue with Al get in the way of that."

"I want double the money, then."

"Fine by me," Aeri says bitterly.

Another awkward silence stretches its welcome and I find myself pressing my ear against the closet's door in order listen to what's going to be said next.

"You better listen because I'm not going to repeat myself. There's been reported activity of people in black cloaks and clothing killing, mugging and kidnapping people on floor four near Caldera Lake, thirteen in the outskirts of the main settlement and this very floor far to the east of the Wolf Plains," Argo explains, "That's just reported activity of people wearing black clothing, however, there's a particular player who has reported he survived an attack by the Laughing Coffin. You might want to check into him, he owns a store in floor twenty."

This can't be. They've been secretly going after that damned guild? I shake my head trying to dismiss everything I just heard but all the secrecy, the sneaking around, the fact that they are heaving this secret meeting; it all falls into place nicely.

"What kind of shop?" Aeri asks.

"That's all I will say," Argo says, "If I'm going to send you guys over to a poor guy that survived an attack I don't want it to weigh in my conscious heavily."

"Fair enough," Al comments.

"Shut up…"Argo spits, "I'll take my leave."

I hear the door swinging open and then slamming back shut.

"Well that was that…"Aeri mutters.

"Yeah…" Al says, "I'll make sure to not come next time."

"I believe we have a more pressing matter to address," Esra says.

"Huh, what are you talking about?" Aeri questions.

"Someone is spying on us," Esra states.

Ah shit.

She moves out of the way and opens the doors to the closet. She grabs me by the neck and savagely throws me out of my hiding place. I crash against the table and fall face first into one of the chairs. I'm not even given the chance to get my bearings when she pins me against the floor with her knee and brandishes her dagger at my face. I've never seen such a scary look on her face as she stares down at me, thankfully she quickly realizes it's me and lowers her weapon.

"Ruri?" she ponders.

"Haha, hey, while I'm into this kind of rough play it's usually with someone I really like," I choke, "Not that you aren't pretty, but, I do have a girlfriend."

"Ruri, what are you doing here?" Aeri asks.

"Running…out of breath," I joke, "How's your day been?"

"Oh geez, I'm sorry," Esra mumbles and stands back up, finally lifting her knee from my neck.

I reach for my neck and rub it gently as I try to sit up.

"Shit. Shit. Shit!" Al says and kicks one of the chairs away from him.

"Are you alone?" Esra asks.

"Yeah…" I say as I stand up, "Damn, I would've never guessed you guys were doing this."

Slowly Esra and Aeri make their way next to Al. He looks all too serious as he stares at me. A blank expression dominates his face as he covers half of his mouth with his hand, he appears to be deep in thought.

"What are we going to do about her?" Aeri asks.

"Master, I need to second Aeri's question," Esra says, "Just what are we going to do with her?"

I scratch the back of my head and laugh nervously.

"Could you perhaps not talk about me like you might chop me into pieces and throw me into a lake?" I say nervously.

"We'll have to do the same thing we did with Esra," Al says.

He walks over to me very slowly, he feels ominous it actually makes me kind of scared.

"Hunt those bastards down with us," he offers.

"The Laughing Coffin?" I ask

He just nods, I look past him and see Esra and Aeri standing behind him looking as imposing if not even more than my own guild leader.

I hesitate to answer, lately I've enjoyed this period of peace, this period where I haven't worried about my livelihood, the lives of my friends, all of it all has just been peaceful and nice. I don't want to put anyone at risk, not my friends, not Kayla, I don't want to risk that, I'm deeply scared of risking that.

"You guys are putting us all in danger…" I say.

"We are being careful," Esra argues.

"How?" I ask, "I tailed you all the way here, what's to say they haven't been doing the same?"

"We aren't leaving any witnesses," Aeri says with a wicked smile.

I feel struck with fear and take a few steps back.

"We…?" I ask.

Esra's and Al's expressions turn bleak and a pit makes itself present in my stomach.

"Y-you've all killed people…" I stutter.

"We could use your help," Al insists.

"An extra pair of eyes, hands and ears can't hurt," Esra mumbles.

"This is not the time to be a hypocrite Ruri," Aeri says with ghoulish relish, "Back in that hidden inn you said you wouldn't mind hunting Klaus down."

She is right; I'm kind of amazed she is the one to remember what I said back then. Then again it's at times like these when I can say she doesn't sound like her usual self. I clench my fists and look around the room to distract myself, never have I felt so distraught about making a decision.

"Is everyone else going to be safe?" I ask, my heart pounding insanely fast, "If we do this I mean…the faster we do it the better it'll be for everyone right?"

I feel like my whole body is shaking but it's merely the fact that my own heart is racing and practically beating out of my eyes that I feel like this.

Al nods at me, he is trying to reassure me. Why do I feel so scared then?

"We are doing the right thing," Esra says but it sounds like she barely believes herself.

I swallow my own spit and can painfully feel how it makes its way down my throat.

"Ok…I'm in," I mutter.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Now this is more like the length I'm used to write per chapter. This chapter I really gotta say was really excited about posting. I know there's been a lack of action lately but god damn do I love writing situations like the one in this chapter. I have a thing for tension I guess. Also I needed an excuse to write a Ruri chapter come on! I know things probably got a little lewd there in the first part of the chapter but I like to think you are all well adjusted individuals of society and are able to deal with some PG-13 situations appropriately. Also I would like to say, I've added DragonofAnnoth's revisions to chapter 52, so you might want to re read that as I think it is now an improved experience.

Now to address that little issue. As you've seen in the latest chapters, I have not been posting them with beta revisions. This is because DragonofAnnoth has been a little busy and he tells me to wait longer if I want him to check my awful writing. He tells me to look into getting another beta-reader but I perhaps grew too accustomed to the way he improved my story. So while I appreciate the fact that has my one beta-reader so far to tell me he might not be able to do more work it's gonna be real hard to change him :( SO this is an official kind of announcement that I'm looking for a new beta-reader so if anyone is interested please PM me!

**SkySlash9: **Glad you like my story! There's more to come so stick around! **IC0: **I really can't express how happy I am that you are still this engrossed into my story, glad to see you are liking how things are turning out!

As always if you like what you or you would like to criticize something please leave a review I totally accept all kinds of feedback! That is all for today, I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter:"Uneasy Cooperation"


	54. Chapter 54 - Uneasy Cooperation

**Chapter 54.- Uneasy Cooperation**

**February/3rd/2024**

**Fourth Floor of Aincrad – Nula Underwater Cave – Caldera Lake**

**Alshep**

I can hear Aeri's grip tighten around her attacker's sword. She mockingly clears her throat with a short cough and then starts moving her head a little, my best guess, waiting for her neck to crack a bit. That cracking sound manages to be loud enough to echo a bit through the cave and she exhales at the pleasurable release of pressure on her neck. She brings her right hand up to the sword and grips the blade tightly with it as well. As I'm standing behind the guy I can't exactly look at his face, but I'm sure he is surprised as hell Aeri is grabbing his sword by the god damn sharp end of it. Aeri nods at me with a creepy smile and I raise my sword in front of me.

She kicks the player in the gut and the weak bastard let's go of his own sword. Aeri takes a step back and still holding his sword swings it at his face. I can see the pommel hitting the side of his face and he backs away towards me as he groans in pain. Aeri throws the sword in front of him and stretches a little. I react quickly behind the guy and drive my sword through his back, making sure my blade goes all the way in to the cross guard. Merely adjusting the angle of my stab is enough to force the member of the Laughing Coffin on his knees. Once the man is on his knees I retrieve my sword and slowly sheathe it. Doing the smart thing the players stays on the ground and raises his hands; I guess he is giving up.

I turn a little to the side and see Esra restraining another hooded figure as Ruri does a bad job at stabbing his chest. She is too careful; it almost looks like the girl doesn't want to hurt the guy. Which I get, this would be her first player kill. I despise the fact that I sort of look down on her for being careful. Just what in the hell have we come to?

"Stop!" the man screams, "Oh god please sto-"

With a pained grunt Ruri drives her short blade through the man's chest and pulls it all the way down to his stomach. The man trembles slightly before dying, his body shattering into those crystals I am now sadly used to seeing.

Ruri's hands shake and she takes a few steps back before dropping her weapon. She breathes in and out rapidly before her knees give in and she finds herself sitting on the floor. Esra picks up Ruri's blade and approaches her; she gently kneels next to her and starts trying to calm her down.

"This is so messed up…" Ruri says with a trembling voice.

"It was either you or him," Esra says.

"We…we attacked first though," Ruri stammers.

"And they didn't hesitate to attack us back," Esra says, "Come, on trying breathing slowly first."

"You are one merry band of psychos, huh?"

I turn my head and see the remaining member of the Laughing Coffin twisting his head around to smile at me.

"What did you say?" Aeri asks.

"I said you are one merr-"

She interrupts the black clad player with a swift kick to the face and keeps kicking him as he groans and complains on the ground.

She looks angry at the player's comment and seems too eager to hurt the poor bastard. She kicks him on his back and starts stomping his head, he tries his best to cover his face but Aeri just needs to move her foot a little in order to still get a clean blow at it.

"Aeri, stop it," I say.

She ignores me and keeps doing her best to hit the player lying on the ground. She is stomping the player so savagely, it almost feels like she forgot she is this cave with us. I can see that creepy smile as she flares her teeth. It makes me shiver a bit.

"Aeri, cut it out!" Ruri yells.

"Leave the guy alone," I huff and push her back.

Upset she pushes me back as well and then retreats to the nearby wall. She leans her back against it and crosses her arms. The cave returns to a silent state where the drops of water dripping from the walls and ceiling are all that can be heard. It dawns on me just how damp this place is as I hear it more cautiously.

"This is getting out of hand," I say, "If you can't keep a straight head I don't think we should be doing this."

Aeri pouts and avoids me at all cost with her eyes. It's like she is just a little kid. She throws tantrums left and right and is bound to be quite explosive if she doesn't get what she wants.

"We shouldn't be doing this in the first place!" Ruri says.

"Now isn't the time start complaining about it," Aeri mutters.

Ruri turns to Aeri and I can see she is perplexed at her words. Ruri looks confused but at the same time it's easy to feel like she is giving her pity.

"What the hell happened to you?" Ruri asks.

Aeri chuckles for a second and then pushes herself off the wall. She takes a few steps towards Ruri and grabs hold of her shoulders.

"Oh, you want to know what happened?" she ask rhetorically, "You should know, we took you in with the man who killed Daath, remember? That's what happened!"

"So now it's my fault?" Ruri answers, "What the hell does that have to do with anything now? You are still hung up on that?!"

"It might as well be!" she yells, her voice twisting in a morbid way, "And don't you fucking dare to tell me how to feel about things!"

Ruri grinds her teeth for a second and then slaps Aeri across of the face.

"You are freaking deranged!" she replies.

"Stop!" Esra intervenes.

Esra places herself between Aeri and Ruri to prevent a fight from breaking out. She stretches her arms out to create a space between them, but Aeri's posture just indicates she isn't in the mood for anything standing in her way right now. She grabs Esra's arm and twist it making her groan in pain before pushing her out of the way. She is about to reach for Ruri when I steps in front of her.

"Just what the hell are you doing?" I ask.

It feels like I make her regain some kind of focus as she looks behind me with wide, shocked eyes. She reaches for my shoulder and pulls on me somewhat harshly.

"Hey, watch out!" she yelps.

I turn myself around to catch in the corner of my eye the player from the Laughing Coffin; he is on his feet and has retrieved his weapon again. I'm ready to take an attack head on when Esra steps in the way of the attacker's blade. The blade slices through her right arm with surprising ease. Esra screams out on in pain as she holds what's left of her right arm. I drop my hand to my sword and activate a slashing skill as I unsheathe it. My sword slides out if its sheathe with lighting speed and I do my best to aim for the player's neck. I can feel my blade stopping for a short breathing second as it makes contact with his neck however the skill just makes it easy for my weapon to cut all the way through. Cutting his head clean off I reluctantly put my sword back on its sheathe. The black hooded individual freezes on the spot and seconds later bursts into crystals. Dammit…

"Great, no we can't get any info out of this," I sigh.

"Yeah, that's going to be a little hard now, huh?" Aeri teases.

I turn to her with a cold look and don't even bother replying to her. I walk past Aeri and stand next to Esra and Ruri. I take hold of Esra's arm and doing my best to be gentle as I examine the damage. She flinches slightly when I touch the end of what is now sadly a stub.

"It will heal shortly…I hope," she mumbles.

"How does that feel?" Ruri wearily asks.

"It's by no means comfortable," Esra answers.

"Your health points look fine, just be extra careful until we get back," I suggest, "Damn…how are we going to explain that…"

"I was attacked by an armed mob, wasn't careful," she says quickly.

Esra is always good thinking on her feet and I can't help but to feel very at ease with how easy she is able to come up with an excuse. I guess it's easy to do so, but my head hasn't been in the greatest of places lately, I feel like I'm losing some kind of edge.

"Let's do a sweep of this little hideout, search their bags and that chest over there," I order, "If we are lucky we might find something."

By just glancing at Aeri one could say she looks exactly like a child that has been neglected something. She crosses her arms and turns her back on the three of us.

"There are better ways to throw a hissy fit," Ruri mumbles.

"Hey, simmer down, alright?" I reply.

Making wet noisy steps as I move I make my way over to what looks like a duffle bag. The thing leans against a wall not too far from a pool of water. I stare at the pristine, unmoving water, and kind of lose myself in how still it is for a second. It probably connects to some other cave farther ahead.

I stay silent as I crouch next to the bag. Annoyed I pull it closer to me and spread it open to inspect its contents. Nothing out of the ordinary, a couple of clothes, potions and pretty much anything you could expect from a player in SAO. Equipment, items, and weapons, the usual someone would store in a container. Rummaging through the small thing I grow frustrated and throw it into the water, destroying the calm, delicate look it had seconds ago. Ripples moves madly over the surface as the water tries to return to its original state. I stand up slowly and look carefully around the room, maybe we are missing something.

"Shut up!" Aeri exclaims all of the sudden.

She makes my head turn to her; she is on one of the far corners of the cave. She brings both of her hands up to her mouth and turns around in a fit of panic. Esra and Ruri are too preoccupied checking the other side of the cave and it seems I'm the only one that manages to hear her suddenly telling someone to shut up. My eyebrow rises and I examine her. I'm all too conscious my stare is lingering on her for more than a few seconds, but she finds herself unable to do anything other than stare back. I'm curious but at the same time somewhat unsettled. I cough and turn my head away to keep looking for something. Not really something I should focus on right now.

"I found something!" Ruri yells, "It's a message record crystal."

The ash haired pervert springs from the floor and makes her way to me. As my own searching around didn't reveal anything fruitful I sluggishly make move closer to her. Esra follows suit in a matter of seconds, followed by Aeri who seems to be reluctantly joining us.

"Alright, let's see if this has anything in it," I say.

Ruri places the light green crystal in my hand and I inspect it a bit before activating it. Activating the crystal turns the thing into a deeper shade of green, I would say turquoise.

The crystal plays back footsteps, they echo loudly, it would seem whatever message is in it was recorded on a cave. Seconds later a voice speaks and it irks me how easily I recognize the owner of said voice. It's his voice, Klaus.

"Our leader is kind of forcing me to record this; he seems to think delivering instructions to the multiple groups of Laughing Coffin through these things is safer as it leaves no real trace of sender and recipient," he says, "I mean, he makes a fair point, but it is also highly unlikely that some of us will get captured and someone would force their way through our messages. After all, if recent events are to be taken into consideration we are being hunted, or at least I believe so. I have reasons to believe this might be the very same person who almost eliminated my former guild. However, it's hard to pin point and even if it were the same dumb girl, there's been a rise in people looking for us ever since our little stunt in the New Year, so in the end it's hard to tell and the higher uppers refuse to act on it yet."

"Guy sure love to talk, huh?" Aeri comments.

"However I'm told to stop being so paranoid, but, I'm merely rambling because you guys don't seem to exercise a lot of caution. No matter what you are doing, whether it is mugging, killing or whatever fancies your little unit you should always be careful. Various groups have gone dark on us recently, so yeah, I think I'm allowed to be paranoid," Klaus explains, "Report anything unusual and be sure to talk to Miku on floor thirty if you are ever in the need of new equipment. That's pretty much it, do what you will with this information and be sure to destroy this crystal once you are done listening to it."

The crystal stops glowing and I put it away in my pocket. I cross my arms and breathe out slowly. Ruri, Esra and Aeri remain quiet for a few seconds. He is unto us, it appears he merely suspects us but this just got a whole lot more dangerous than we already thought it was. My eyes dart over to Aeri and I bite my finger a little as I keep thinking things over. God dammit. I'm the first to admit we haven't been exactly careful about the way we have been doing things, but I thought it would take longer for them to figure out we are hunting them down.

"It would be wise to contact Argo about this Miku individual," Esra comments.

"Yeah," I slowly agree, "He knows it's us hunting him down, he definitely knows…"

"Bullshit, The Army has recently taken interest in the Laughing Coffin too. It's dumb to think we might be the only ones doing something about it, right?" Aeri complains.

"You are the only one who has decided to kill them though…" Ruri mutters.

"We, honey, we have been killing them" Aeri seethes.

Ruri's expression turns to a really upset one and she holds her own hands together as if she were trying to calm herself down.

"It is true The Army has been tracking leads to the Laughing Coffin but if the rumors are to be believed they really haven't been successful," Esra says.

"We'll go silent," I propose, "For a month at least."

"What?!" Aeri spits, "Why?"

"Why the hell do you think?" I reply.

I walk close to her and get my face awfully close to hers. It's hard to drive ideas into that thick skull of hers sometimes.

"They are unto us," I miff, "And I don't know about you, but all of this was supposed to be done in secret, yet he's found out."

"But…"

"No buts!" I yell, "We are going dark for a while."

She makes sure to express her reluctance with a grunt and quick turn to face away from me. I'm sure she could easily say no to everything I just said, but at least she's understood that as of late that it's easier and smarter to avoid going into conflict with me. I've probably been as hot headed as she is lately but it's been rather helpful recently.

"It's for the best," Ruri says.

"Yeah, we must at least be sure we are being careful," Esra says, "We've been too reckless."

"Yeah, whatever…" Aeri mumbles.

I hear a ringing sound and in reaction I swipe my hand down in front of me. Making my menu appear I notice I have a new message. It's a message from Asuna. The subject reads "Meeting". I turn on my feet as I dismiss my menu.

"Hey Aeri I got a message fro-"

"Asuna?" she asks, "Yeah, just got it too."

Feeling a bit in distress I open Asuna's message.

-From: Asuna  
-To: Alshep, Aeri  
-Subject: Meeting.  
-Message: Ok, I hope you guys are ready. We are all finally getting together to discuss how we are going to go about clearing floor fifty four. Tension with the guilds is rather high so I doubt it's going to be a pleasant meeting. The main guilds along with volunteers such as your guild will be meeting on floor thirty nine, inside the Knights of the Blood Headquarters to be precise. Bring your whole guild, except for those two under leveled players you have. Send me a message when you arrive and I'll be sure to let you guys in, security is rather tight as of late, so they might have a problem or two to pick with Aeri and that other red player on your guild.

I notice that I have a knot in my throat; starting to feel really worried I scratch the back of my head and sigh out deeply.

"Ok…guess we are finally doing this," I mutter, "Esra, rally everyone up except for Sinna and Elina."

"You are kind of keeping us in the dark here, boss," Ruri complains.

"We are being called for a meeting with the clearers," he says.

* * *

**Thirty Ninth Floor of Aincrad – Knights of the Blood HQ**

"Hey come on," Kayla says a she pats my back, "Relax a little, I can literally see how tense you are."

Feeling her hand hit my backside for a full three seconds I just groan nonsensically.

"Leave the man alone, everyone is a little tense right now," Billfray says.

"Yeah, even little guy here is worried," Twyla says as she pat pats Edelweiss' side.

"What in the world is little about him?" Hotoka asks.

"He is a little baby," Twyla huffs as she hugs the giant lizard's neck, "Ain't that right?"

Edelweiss perks his neck up and wags his tail in joy as her owner hugs him. In the process his tail manages to bump Aereth to the side as we make our way through the cramped hallway of the KoB Headquarters. Walking ahead of me is Asuna, who is just slightly turning her head to see us, she smiles at me with her lips and then laughs for a short second.

"Heh, what is it?" I ask.

"I never expected your whole guild to be…like this," she says.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Siren mutters.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean as offense," Asuna replies.

"I…I didn't mean for it to sound like I took it as that…" Siren mumbles stiffly.

"You all seem very close, it's nice," Asuna explains herself, "It's hard to see that in bigger guilds."

"I guess we are some kind of big family…" Hotoka says.

Virtually everyone turns to look at her, she wears a soft smile until she realizes we are all staring at her. Her cheeks go red with blood and she starts waving her arms in front of her.

"I mean like, uh," she stumbles, "We kind of are, stop looking at me, god!"

I chuckle and smile at her comment. At some point I came up with the same thought, I was just a bit embarrassed to sound it off to everyone. It makes me feel happy that she thinks of this guild like a family.

We come to a stop in front of a massive set of doors and Asuna puts both of her arms on them.

"Well, either way," she says, "Welcome to our headquearters."

Asuna swings the massive doors open and we are greeted with an astounding amount of people. Some are wearing uniforms, some have different kinds of colored gear but this meeting hall is clearly divided by guilds. Red and white are the prominent colors as players of the KoB are the obvious majority here.

"Well, I'll see you later on," Asuna says as she waves us goodbye.

We all nod at her and she takes her leave as she goes deeper into the crowded hall.

"Holy shit, this a lot of people," Kayla exclaims.

"Language," Aereth huffs.

"Sinna isn't around, dude," Aeri laughs.

"Nevermind then," Aereth sighs.

We are a little too focused on laughing when a deep, imposing voice overpowers every single other one in the room.

"It seems all the guilds asked to be gathered here are now with us," the voice says.

"Alright, everyone, let's get closer," I order and walk farther into the hall.

We position ourselves just behind another group of players. They seem to be one of the groups of volunteers as they don't seem to be wearing either the colors of the KoB or DDA and they sure as hell aren't wearing Army armor.

"However, I will ask the volunteer guilds to leave, it would seem my orders were misinterpreted, as I only asked for one volunteer group in particular to show up," the voice says, "I appreciate your support for showing up, but you will not be needed."

"What a waste of time," Billfray hisses.

"So please, all the volunteer groups except for the guild named Steel and Swords leave this hall."

My blood runs cold, we were just hand-picked by clearers. I swallow my own spit as the other groups of players walk through us in order to get to the door. Once they leave what is left in front of us is an open space at a massive circular table. I approach the table slowly at first, I become a little worried that everyone else might not be following behind me but they don't even hesitate to walk with me. I take my place at the front and feel awkward as hell as the people who I can only assume to be the leaders of the clearing guilds stare at me. I recognize a few faces but even then I feel like I've been put under a pretty big spotlight.

I spot Klein along the table and he nods at me with a smile, that guy is all heart, I swear. At the opposite end of the table I spot Asuna, she stands next to a really told, old looking man. His hair is gray, very long, almost silky looking and tied up in a ponytail. An odd style for an old man but I guess it suits him. My eyes keep darting around the table and I spot the ever so tactful leader of the DDA. My eyes meet for a second with Lind's but he is quick to give me the stink eye. The only one I'm not spotting from our previous meeting with the guilds is Yulier, but after all she did say she wasn't her guild's leader.

"So you are the guild I've been hearing so much about," the man next to Asuna says.

So that bossy voice belongs to him, huh?

"I hardly see how they would be of any help here, Heathcliff," Lind complains, "There are far more capable volunteer guilds with who we've worked in the past, why bring these newbies into the fray."

Asuna leans forward, almost over the table but this Heathcliff guy stops her by putting his hand over her shoulder.

"I know you don't enjoy reading the reports, Lind," Heathcliff huffs, "But if the information this guild turned in is to be believed, they might just be the most capable volunteers we'll ever get."

"What a load of horse shit," Lind exclaims, "How are they capable, I bet they haven't even faced a boss before!"

"Be that as it may," a voice comes in from the right.

A man with slightly ruffled hair crosses his arms; behind him I can see a huge amount of steel armored men. He wears what I can only describe as some kind of military uniform, badges adorn the upper left part of his chest and he wears a blue band around his left arm. He is the leader of the Aincrad Liberation Force, the leader of the so called Army. He scratches his side burns and sighs out in annoyance to Lind's tone.

"The reports state the players of this guild are all over level seventy one," he says.

Players all around the hall break out into chatter and I feel proud for a few seconds. We've been training hard, there's no lie in that. We've been taking on high leveled mobs in order to catch up to these clearers and with the constant information updates Asuna asked of me I guess we managed to impress even the strongest players in this game.

"Thinker is right, this guild has been training hard, all with the goal of helping us out," Klein says with a smile.

I hear Ruri cough behind me, it could be unrelated but her seemingly random cough makes me think of other things. While what Klein says is kind of true, some of us have been getting stronger to pursue other goals.

"Most noteworthy though, is that they have one particularly strong player," Heathcliff comments, "A player whose current level stands at seventy seven. Is that correct?"

Lind's jaw drops as he stares at me and slowly I can feel all the eyes on this room slowly fixate on me. I cough a little to clear my throat and nod.

"It is true," I admit, "My second in command is level seventy seven."

"That is truly amazing," Thinker comments while he holds his chin with his right hand, "Remarkable, I'm glad to welcome you to the war effort."

"I hope that sets your worries to rest Lind," Heathcliff says, "Allow me to comment on how happy I am that his meeting turned out this way, for once we all seem to have gathered. My sub-leader tells me in previous meetings some guilds failed to show up."

"Glad to see your lap dog is telling on us," Lind huffs.

Asuna is about to practically leap at Lind again when her leader stops her once more.

"It's not my fault you never come to the meetings, you didn't' even help us on the last two floors! If you cared just a little maybe you would show up!" Asuna growls.

"What's done is done, let's just be glad we all managed to meet up this time," Thinker says.

"Are they really this disorganized?" Kayla asks, "I thought they cleared the floors together."

"Nah, some of these guilds have cleared floors on their own, they don't exactly like working together," Hotoka says.

"How do you know?" Siren asks.

"If you came out of your room for something other than training you would hear the rumors," Hotoka replies.

Billfray snickers for a second before being hit over the head by Aereth.

"Keep it down," he huffs.

"I didn't say anything," Billfray whines.

"Alright, let's start talking business," Lind says, clearly upset, "The DDA can spare two parties for the raid."

Asuna laughs halfheartedly and shoots a smug grin the leader of the DDA.

"How generous," she mocks.

"Heathcliff I suggest you do something about her attitude, or I will stop attending these meetings," Lind says.

"Oh, you mean completely stop attending?" Asuna keeps teasing.

"Asuna, if I'm here, I would appreciate you don't speak on the behalf of our guild," Heathcliff says bitterly.

Like a scolded puppy Asuna's head droops a little and she stares at the ground. She takes a step back and sighs.

"We only have a handful of players willing to participate on this one, but," Klein pauses, "I think we can manage three parties. Also I wouldn't mind if Steel and Swords were to be our support."

"Great idea," Thinker comments, "I also second that idea, the new guild should focus on supporting the Fuurinkazan. Lower risk as they are newcomers, if they fare well maybe they will be more eager to help us out with future bosses."

This Thinker guy makes it feel like we are some kind of item or something. He says it like they were going to use us for something. The worry I feel seems to be growing even bigger but it's not the time to show it.

"The Aincrad Liberation Force can assist with three parties as well," Thinker says.

I take the initiative and speak out as I see every other leader doing so.

"We don't have many numbers but we can make two strong parties of five players," I state, "We'll gladly assist the Fuurinkazan if that's what's needed of us."

"That leaves us, sadly we can only spare three parties as well," Heathcliff says, "It seems the higher we go the less people are willing to fight. The survey battles were sloppy and we lost some people, but we believe the information we gathered to be sufficient. We'll be facing a boss called "Xorina's Beast", I'll make sure each of the leaders receive a report before exiting this hall. If you have any questions you all know how to reach each other."

"Sounds just fine," Thinker says, "Maybe we are just a bit short on numbers for this raid, but I'm positive we are strong. If you say the information should be sufficient, I don't see why we would have a problem. It's now just a matter of coordinating the parties."

"I feel kind of nervous to be honest," Esra mumbles behind me.

"We all are," I reply softly.

Klein slams the table with his fists and the raises only his left into the air.

"Yeah, we are sure to win!" he says enthusiastically, "Alshep, we should meet later, maybe get some strategies down."

"Of course," I nod at the samurai

"I guess we'll see how this thing goes…" Lind huffs.

"Alshep, right?" Heathcliff asks.

I nod at the leader of the KoB and try my best to stand upright. Again everyone surrounding this table seems to be focusing only on me. I really have to work on how cool I can look in front of people; it can only help my image. Heathcliff smiles, along with Asuna who gives me a reassuring nod.

"Welcome to the front lines."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I gotta say I'm liking a lot to write about other guilds and their interactions in the world. It feels like I'm writing a whole new genre when I write the dialogue heavy discussion and what not. Either way as I said action stuff will come soon, after all we are getting ready for a boss battle aren't we? Other than that there's not much I wish to comment on for this week.

**IC0:** I'm glad you see the chapters in that way, to be honest it's how I want them to look but as you say the change is a little more subtle with the weekly updates. **SkySlash9: **Haha good to hear so, hope I can keep it that way! **Fancy: **Kinda of hope you make it this far, cause as a matter of fact I do still make chapters for this, and will continue to do so for a while longer.

That's a wrap for today! Hey have you read this far and never left a review? How about you leave a little sentence or even a word of what you think of my story? I would absolutely love to hear what any of you have to say about it, be it good or bad! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Beast Master"


	55. Chapter 55 - Beast Master

**Chapter 55: Beast Master**

**February/5th/2024**

**Fifty Fourth Floor of Aincrad – Twenty Second Floor of the Labyrinth of Beasts**

**Twyla**

"Are you ready buddy?" I ask.

Edelweiss growls at me with a particularly angry tone. A growl that either means don't talk to me or there are too many people here. I place both of my hands on my hips and lean in close to his scaly face. His eyes narrow at me and he flares his teeth, his sharp teeth making a display to just how upset he is right now. I don't blame him this corridor is too narrow and too crowded. Although my little baby is mad for another reason. At least we've reached the door to the boss room, it's open and the boss is practically waiting for us to go inside, but we've decided to take a break outside. Eat some food, recover health. Everything feels very surreal too, I never pictured myself fighting a boss, but here we are.

"Now, that was rude, you don't talk to mommy like that," I pout.

I see him open his mouth and I back away as he makes a lousy attempt and trying to bite me. I slap him over the head and he growls loudly, sounding even more pissed off. While I'm worrying about how this whole situation feels I can see other people are really not even bothering about it at all. Ruri is taking a nap as she rests her head over Kayla's legs and Siren seems to also be dozing off as she leans on the wall, of course while not letting go of her spear.

"What the hell? He almost bit you!" Aereth says.

"I haven't fed him in a while," I admit.

"So he is going to turn on you or something?" He asks.

I nod as I open my inventory.

"It could happen. Beast taming is easier than most people make it out to be," I say and take out a comically big steak out of my inventory, "You just have to feed them yummy food and give them the occasional belly rub."

I throw the steak in Edelweiss' direction and he wastes no time in leaping off the ground to catch it. He lands clumsily on his hind legs and slips on his side. Not minding at all the way he fell on the ground he just keeps happily munching on the steak. I approach him and get on my knees; I reach out for his scaly skin and slowly start stroking his belly.

"See?" I say with a smile.

"Right, hell, that scared me, I could've sworn he had your head," Aereth sighs.

"Nah, he's too good of a guy to hurt me," I reply.

"If you say so," Aereth says and walks over next to Aeri.

Edelweiss rolls back on his legs and nuzzles my face; he sticks his long tongue out to lick my arms as I try to push him away.

Taming is easy to master as it is easy to lose. Not many people attempt it because it involves quite a lot of risk, after all who in their right mind would want to approach a potentially aggressive mob in order to see if there is a chance to tame it. Let's say you do approach it, if you do then you have to make sure you feed it something it likes, otherwise you are not only approaching a mob head on but it will also be mad that you feed it something it didn't like. If you manage to give it something it likes you just have to keep it fed, if you do that you'll have a loyal pet. In the end, I've never been one to have a "right" mind and I love animals. When I found out about the fact that players had the ability to do so I had to get myself a pet, it was rather lonely back then after all.

"Alright, Asuna says we should be ready in ten minutes," Al says, "So, eat something, and group up close to the door."

"Sure thing, boss!" Hotoka says with a ton of enthusiasm as she leaps from the rock she was sitting at.

Aeri slowly rises from the floor and equips those weird gauntlets of hers. She turns around to look at us and frowns.

"Kayla, wake up your girlfriend. Billfray get up from your sorry ass," she spits.

"Man, these people have a weird way of organizing things," Billfray complains.

He uses the snath of his scythe to stand up and casually uses the massive weapon as a cane to walk over to the gathering crowd of players. Kayla stretches a bit and flicks Ruri's forehead with her finger. Ruri snaps out from a short lived nap and yawns as she gets back on her feet.

"How can you sleep at a time like this?" Kayla asks.

"Why do you have to physically abuse me to wake me up?" Ruri whines.

I laugh a little and jump over Edelweiss' back. Esra walks past me as she tightens her apron around her back. She makes sure to walk ahead of everyone else and sets herself right next to Al. She's always been odd in my eyes, taking this maid role so seriously, but it's not like I can judge. After all I'm prancing around half naked with a giant pet lizard.

"How is that abuse?!" Kayla exclaims.

"It hurt my sensitive forehead."

"Is that because it's so big?" Billfray jokes.

"Hahahahaha!" Ruri laughs loudly, clearly faking it, "You are so funny Billfray! Ahaha!"

"Damn, learn to take a joke," he says.

"Would you like it if I made fun of your ridiculously small hands?" Ruri asks.

Billfray looks down at his hands and raises his left hand up to his face.

"My hands are not small though," he says and places his hand on top of Ruri's face, "Well I guess they are smaller than your forehead."

Ruri's hand go up and almost manage to go around Billfray's neck when Kayla pulls her away and retreats to stand behind our little group close to the door. Aereth walks past me as well and pushes Billfray along with him.

"You are gonna get your ass kicked if you keep teasing her like that," Aereth says.

"Aw, come on, I'm just joking around," Billfray pleads.

"Well she might just kick your ass while joking around," Aereth replies.

I rest both of my hands over Edelweiss' back and breathe out slowly. I push myself up a little and sit a bit more comfortably.

"So, are you ready now, buddy?" I ask with a smile.

I can feel how he wags his tail around and see how he nods at my question. I kick his sides softly and so he marches on towards the rest of our guild. I'm able to see above everyone's head thanks to my dear baby. The girl from the KoB takes center stage as she lifts her hand in the air. Asuna if I'm not wrong.

"Alright listen up!" she yells to get everyone's attention, "This should be an easy fight, after all the scouting party said they almost managed to kill the boss. However, they got careless, and the minions that help the boss managed to kill a few of them. So, as we agreed, there will be six parties concentrating on attacking the boss while the other seven concentrate on killing the minions. The fighting area is big and rectangular according to recon. All corners of the area are in thick shadows so try to stay in the light as these shadows seem to be the minions spawn points. Xorina's Beast seems to favor the far end of the room so the attacking parties will do most of their fighting there."

"We are only concentrating on the minions, right?" Siren asks me as she finishes yawning.

I nod at her and watch her steady herself with her spear; she seems to take a long time to come out of her drowsy state.

"The three parties from the Fuurinkazan , two parties from the KoB, and the two parties from Steel and Swords will be the ones in charge of killing the minions," she says, "This leaves one party of the KoB, the two parties from the DDA and the three parties from the Aincrad Liberation Force to fight the boss. Be careful, stick to your tactics and I'm more than sure we can make it out of this one unscathed."

A man with spiky red hair comes into view as he takes his place next to the girl. I'm pretty sure I've seen him before too, but his name really does escape me. He is the leader of one of the guilds, I'm almost sure of it.

"Alright, just a quick recap for the parties fighting the minions," he says, "These oversized wolf cub-like creatures are called "Xorina's pups" they are fairly easy to kill but the problem is that they come around in groups of five or seven. If they manage to isolate a player it will be really easy for them to kill him or her. So as Asuna said, be careful and stick to what we discussing, stick to your party and we should have no problem."

Asuna unsheathes her sword and so does the man with spiky hair.

"Form up!" Asuna yells, "Give it your all! Today we advance to floor fifty five!"

The crowd of players grows overzealous as they all start chanting and screaming in synch. The first ones to go in will be the ones supporting the attack of the boss. That means us. Our guild makes its way behind the Fuurinkazan and we take our place right in front of the door. Staring right into the arena we will shortly be fighting in.

"Alright, split up in the parties we set up," Al orders.

We all nod at him and with my legs I guide Edelweiss to step a little to the right. My party consists of Billfray, Siren, Hotoka and Kayla. Al decided that we work best together. On the other side there's Al, Aeri, Ruri, Aereth and Esra. We are short one player each but Sinna and Elina wouldn't really help us since they are a bit underleveled. Everyone takes their weapons out and I reach down at my leg and take hold of my katar. I grab the handle and lift it up to my face. It's a simple design nothing too shabby, I don't like fancy weaponry. There's just something I like about a big blade that seems to stick out of your fist.

"Let's do this!" Someone shouts and the first parties start flooding the room.

Edelweiss takes a step back and lowers his head as much as possible in-between Billfray's legs. I start kicking his sides and poke his back.

"No, don't you dare," I huff.

The party in front of us moves in and Edelweiss moves forwards and then flicks his head back, throwing Billfray in front of me. Edelwiess moves to do the same with Siren, then Hotoka and finally Kayla. All five of us ride Edelweiss into the room. Billfrays seems to be indifferent to the situation whereas Hotoka, Siren and Kayla scream as my massive pet storms the room. A set of five oversized wolf cubs appear from the right side of the room and starts to attack the parties that came in before us. In the back of the room a giant wolf like creature stares at us, its eyes shining in a really morbid shade of red.

Xorina's Beast waits patiently in the back of the room, its fur covered in blood, its body visible scarred. Arrows stick out in all directions from its skin and in some parts you can see wounds so deep you can see the bone under its own skin. A gruesome sight, but thankfully we won't be fighting that today. The attacking parties come in right after us and each player in their group makes a mad dash towards the end of the room. They all do their best to stay out of the supporting groups' way and a deafening howl is heard once the first of their parties start attacking the boss. Edelweiss comes to a sudden stop making everyone in front of me slide down his neck and into the ground.

"A little heads up would be nice next time!" Kayla frowns.

"I'm sorry, he just started moving on his own," I apologize.

A group of cubs approach us from the side and I can't help but to notice something moving in the shadows past them. Hotoka, Siren and Billfray jump off and they start activating skills on their weapons. Edelweiss turns around and with his head tracks something deep in the shadows.

"You saw it too, huh?" I ask.

He nods but returns his attention to the group of cubs approaching us. I slide down from his left side and pat his neck with my free hand.

"We got this," I say softly.

"Alright let's do this!" Billfray exclaims and extends the reach of his scythe to the first cub.

With the blade of his weapon he pulls the animal close to him and kicks it in the face forcing it to step back into his blade. Siren steps in from the side and drives her spear clean through the side of the cub. To finish the first cub off Hotoka jumps and stabs her sword through the cub's head. The enemy shatters into crystals and that leaves us with four more of the cubs to kill.

"Go!" I yell and run with Edelweiss to the remaining cubs.

He rams them with all his strength and manages to spread them apart. Roaring he bites the closest cub to him in the neck and savagely swings him around before throwing it to the side. The cub whimpers as it hits the ground not too far from us but quickly gets back on its feet.

"I got left," Siren says as she jumps on top of Edelweiss.

She jumps up again and stabs one of the scattered cubs in the back. Billfray runs up next to her and attacks a cub that was about to pounce on Siren. They both nod at each other and with skills of their own attack the cubs. Billfray's scythe stabs the cub which Siren attacked first and Siren's spear hits the cub that almost got her across the face. Trading targets in just a heartbeat they seem to be in perfect synch.

"Coming through!" Hotoka yells as she slides underneath Edelweiss, "Siren!"

Siren turns around takes hold of Hotoka's arm, easily springing her back on her feet. Hotoka slashes the cub closest to Billfray and after a flurry of cuts stabs the thing in-between the eyes successfully killing it.

"Ok, so it's us and Edelweiss," Kayla says.

"Yup!" I say with a wide smile.

She lifts her rapier in front of her and I see it shine a pretty shade of red. Striking a ladylike pose she sets her free hand on her hips and with her weapons tracks a cub that is slowly approaching us.

"Go get your chew toy," I say.

Edelweiss runs past the cub approaching us and attacks the one he was biting just seconds ago. I feel my weapon slowly vibrating in my hands and place myself ahead of Kayla.

"You go low?" she asks.

I nod and lower my stance to let Kayla see the enemy in front of us. The cub also lowers its stance; he gets closer with each passing second. The cub howls at us and the pounces in my direction. I fall flat on my back as it's going over me and I stab my weapon in its stomach. I hold in place and see Kayla take a step back before unleashing countless stabs right in the creature face. As soon as she is finished pull my blade out the thing's stomach and pull my arm back. I activate the puncture skill and push my weapon back inside the cub. It whimpers in pain and wriggles it legs around before disappearing over me.

"Come on, your pet is having trouble," Kayla says as she offers me her hand.

I turn my head while I still lie in the floor and see that Edelweiss is growling constantly as he tries to bite the cub that has somehow found its way over his back. I grab Kayla's hand and get up from the ground. I run towards Edelweiss and with a skill jump at the cub that is biting Edelweiss' back.

"You don't hurt my baby!" I huff and slash the damn cub.

I stand over Edelweiss' back and kick the damn thing off his back. Kayla catches up and stabs the cub a couple of times before jumping back.

"All yours big guy," Kayla says.

Edelweiss growls and quickly turns his body around. With one of his front legs he steps on the cub's neck and starts biting its face. I walk off Edelweiss' back and place myself next to Kayla. Edelweiss might not be good at dealing damage but he is heavy and there is no way the cub can escape from under him. I stand at ease as it seems we have successfully eliminated our group of cubs. I turn my head slightly and confirm this as I see Billfray easily decapitating the last cub on his side.

"The boss is at half health already!" someone yells.

"Shit!" I hear Aeri huff as she is overpowered by a cub on her end.

Al and Aereth quickly back her up as they both slash the cub on top of her. Both of their attacks make a neat cross across the animal's body and it shatters above Aeri.

"Get your shit together!" Al yells and forcefully pulls Aeri back up.

"Yeah, yeah," Aeri grumbles.

The other groups seem to be done as well and we are left in an odd standstill for a few seconds. Multiple howls sound off around us and more cubs start coming out of the shadows. I raise my weapon and desperately look for that odd figure in the shadows again; there must be something to it. I see something dash behind the cubs that are coming out from the shadows. I turn my head to Edelweiss. He is staring at me, waiting for my command. I'm sure he sees it too. I raise my free hand and point at him with two fingers and then point towards the shadows. He nods and rushes towards the shadows. He tramples a few cubs that are dumb enough to stand in his way. Growling he jumps into the shadows and disappears from my sight.

"Where is he going?" Kayla asks.

"There's something in the shadows," I answer.

"What do you mean?"

"Yeah I saw something too!" Hotoka says.

"The recon party missed something," I answer.

"That can't be good…" Siren mumbles.

Edelweiss jumps out from the shadows with something in his mouth. It looks like a person but it's all covered up in gray garb. He runs towards us and pushes the cubs approaching us out of the way again. He drops what he is carrying when he is next to us and we finally see what looks like a deformed woman.

"What the hell?" Kayla huffs.

Her legs are that of a wolf; however her hands look human even though they seem to be covered in fur. She hides her face with a hood and when my eyes reach her face as see a single health bar appear right next to her. The name above the bar reads "Xorina".

"Wait so…that thing over there…" Siren says while pointing at the massive wolf in the back of the room.

We all turn our head towards Xorina's Beast and stare as the massive beast has stopped attacking the players near it. The five meter tall wolf seems to have fixated all of its attention on us. The cubs slowly retreat back to the shadows whimpering almost in unison and I can feel something is definitely wrong.

"She is some kind of beast tamer…" I mutter.

"And that's her pet…" Billfray sighs, "Shit."

Xorina's beast howls loudly and starts trampling its way towards our party. After a few steps it simply leaps in the air and lands right in front of us. With its massive paws it swipes at us. It hits Hotoka, Siren, Kayla and Billfray out of the way. Edelweiss steps in front of me to take the blow and he stands his ground as he growls angrily at the beast. Xorina kicks me in the face and with incredible speed retreats behind her beast. She hastily searches through the pockets of her garbs and takes out a red pellet. She crushes the thing in her hands and then touches the massive wolf.

The beast regains all of its health instantly and howls right above me and Edelweiss. I stand up and taking food out of my inventory feed Edelweiss. Keeping his eyes trained on the beast he takes the food out of my hands. My attention is fully concentrated on the woman standing below the massive beast.

"Everyone retreat!" Asuna yells.

Players run to the boss room door, going around Xorina's Beast in the process. I would run as well but unlike everyone else in the room I'm the biting range of a five meter tall wolf. Edelweiss starts growling loudly and impatiently stomps the floor below his feet.

"Twyla!" I hear my guild leader scream.

I raise my hand and then lift my thumb into the air. It will be fine, I think.

"Hey, boy," I mutter.

He growls back acknowledging my voice.

"Can you distract that ugly thing, while I go for its master?" I ask.

He growls back and stomps the ground harder. This is just a hunch but maybe if I get her, the beast will stand down. If I kill its master the beast is sure to stand down, I know it. I ready up the puncture skill on my katar and as soon as I take my first step towards the beast Edelweiss growls and runs ahead of me. I run to Xorina who is hiding behind the front legs of her beast. The beast swipes at me but Edelweiss blocks his attack, my baby takes all the damage meant for me but I'm sure he can take it. It gives me just the opening I need to reach Xorina. I hear Edelweiss growl and complain, he is pain but I'm almost there, I can do it. I reach the woman and drive my weapon right through her. Her health drops to all the way to zero just with one hit and I smile as I see her shatter right in front of me. A particularly happy song chimes into my ears, I did it. A short victorious melody. I cleared a boss. The beast still towers above me but it has seized all movement. Without a master it seems it no longer pose a threat.

"We did it boy!" I say happily as I turn around.

I see my baby's limp body dangling from the beast's mouth above me. I lose all strength in my legs and fall on the ground. I try to soften the impact with my hand but I just make it so I feel the impact slither its way up my arms. Huge letters in the air read a message saying "Congratulations!" behind them Edelweiss body disappears and something drops from the wolf's mouth.

The beast retreats to one of the dark corners of the room and I stand up, feeling my legs wobble as I do. A sea of players run towards me, they are smiling and cheerfully screaming in my direction. I walk against them and push them out of the way as they get to me.

"Move!" I scream, "Edelweiss…he…"

I keep pushing player after player out of the way, they are trying to congratulate me. They are saying thank you. They are happy and overjoyed but they are in the way. I push another player out of the way and see my guild leader crouching on the floor. He slowly stands up and turns around, he holds something in his hands but I just reach out to his chest plate and pull him close to me.

"Al!" I wail, "Where is he? He was there and…and…Al…Edelweiss he…he."

He grabs my hands and places what he is holding into my palm. I get a hold of it and feel it. It's a part of him, a part of my baby. I turn it over and see one of Edelweiss' scales in my hand.

"No…no, no." I sob.

"I'm sorry Twyla," Al says softly.

-Items: 1-

-Edelweiss' Heart-

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Is it bad that I feel really sad about what I did to poor resident lizard over there? When I finished writing this chapter I felt super sad for Twyla. I guess we'll just have to see how things further develop. Moving on to other things! YEAH ACTION! While I'll admit it's a bit short lived I think it's pretty decent, obviously not up to par to the chapter where Aeri tears down a boss with Asuna but still good. Also I realize I didn't wish any of you happy holidays I'm a horrible person aren't I? Either way, you guys will be reading chapter 56 of Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds in the new year! So happy New Year. Damn, a year of writing fanfiction. Now that is something I don't want my relatives to find out about. Hahaha.

**Electronic Ink 0:** Thank you so much! Hope I can keep you as engaged in the future! **Steve the man: **Good to see you are not dead, tension is a big part of my story I think, also I like torturing you guys since you have to wait a week to read what happens next. **IC0: **I like to think the NerveGear would just help the hallucinations to be there with more clarity than in a normal case. Also the fact that there is such a thing as emotional prints and stuff like that in SAO really help me when playing this split personality aspect with Aeri. And by helping I mean I don't really have to explain all that much cause high tech gaming helmet. :P I have a feeling you'll like next week's chapter.

As always if you like or hate what you read, please leave a review! I enjoy reading what people have to say about my story. I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Losing Control"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 8.- Gray Names**

**Elina**

They've been gone for a few hours now, yet all I have been doing is staring at their names in friends tab. As long as they aren't grayed out it's all good. I wish I could've convinced Al to keep me in his party, at least that way I could've kept track on his health. Why do I worry so much? Everyone said it would be an easy boss fight, yet my stomach goes out of its way to make me feel queasy and my heart is beating faster and faster as time goes by.

"Elina!" Sinna says as she opens the door, "You in here?"

She is done opening the door when she sees me sitting at the edge of my bed. I dismiss my menu and wave at her awkwardly.

"Hi!" she says.

"Could you knock next time?" I say.

"I'm sorry," she says and walks in.

She runs in my direction and throws herself over my bed.

"This isn't fair, your bed is like huge!" she says.

Sinna rolls around and flaps her arms around in the bed, making a mess of it. I laugh a little but feel a bit bad that Esra meticulously makes the bed so they are almost immaculate, and here is Sinna making a mess of it.

"Well it's because I have to share it," I say.

"I share one too!" she says.

"Huh? I thought you had your own room…" I mutter.

She sits up and scooches closer to me with a smile.

"I do," she says.

"Then why do you share a bed?"

"I sometimes sleep with Aeri and sometimes with Aereth!" she replies.

Sinna is just a few years younger than me, yet she acts rather childish. I'm not the most mature person in the world but I like to think I act older than my age. I guess it just depends in the way you are raised or what happens to you. Considering Sinna's life up to this point I can only assume she was very dependent on her sister and family.

"I see, " I say, "Say, why were you looking for me?"

"I was getting bored," she says and swipes the air to bring down her menu, "I keep looking at their names and I feel a bit scared to be honest."

In the end it looks like we are worrying about similar things.

"They'll be alright," I say, "They are pretty strong on their own and with all those other players they can't fail."

Sinna browses over to her friends tab and it quickly displays the names of the people she has added. I'm left a bit shocked once I discover the players she's friended are limited to us alone. I can see her full list of friends, all lined up in the display, no scroll bar on the side to keep inspecting the tab itself.

Aereth, Aeri, Alshep, Billfray, Elina, Esra, Hotoka, Kayla, Ruri, Siren and Twyla.

Those are the names on her friends tab, at least they are the ones that are not grayed out. One name alone is grayed out on her friends tab, the name belongs to her sister. Meira.

"As long as the names stay like this…" she mutters, "Everything will be alright."

I hold Sinna close to my side and gently rub her back. I feel like I suddenly have a deep connection to her and breathe in slowly through my nose.

"Try not to worry too much, I'm sure you are right," I say.

"Really?" she asks.

"Yeah, everything will be alright."


	56. Chapter 56 - Losing Control

**Chapter 56: Losing Control**

**February/5th/2024**

**Fifty Fourth Floor of Aincrad – Twenty Second Floor of the Labyrinth of Beasts**

**Alshep**

It had been a while since I had this exact same feeling. The feeling of that odd pit in my stomach, that feeling of insecurity and fear, they are all too present right now. No player died in this battle; however we lost someone close to us, someone that kept a special place in our daily routines, someone that wasn't even human. Yet he was important to us, probably more than he would ever know.

Twyla falls on her knees as she wails uncontrollably, she holds what's left of Edelweiss close to her chest. Tears flow without sign of stopping from her eyes and they fall on the ground after finishing their path down her face. I'm struggling myself to keep composure myself. That dumb lizard…dammit.

Ruri and Kayla kneel close to Twyla and they both embrace the poor girl. This just makes her crying louder, she wraps her arms around both Ruri and Kayla and just wails. By now every other player has stopped celebrating and now stands around my guild members, watching Twyla cry, staring at us; it feels like they are judging us. It irks me so much. I want to tell them to stop staring, that they should back away and mind their own business but I can't, my mouth won't cooperate. Feeling sudden warmth over my shoulders makes me flinch and turn to see what it is. Asuna gently grabs my arm as I turn spastically to her.

"I'm…sorry," she says.

"It's not your fault," I mutter and turn to look at Twyla once more, "He did what he had to do."

"He sacrificed himself…" Hotoka mumbles, "for her…"

A weird place inside me is glad that I'm not the only one suffering from the death of a digital animal. He was a part of my guild, even if he wasn't human, even if he really wasn't aware of it. I cared for him. He thought me to appreciate little dumb things, watching him eat Esra's food with enthusiasm and then prance around like a small dog begging for more; it was just something that made me smile. It really did.

"Hey, who cares, you tamers can just get other pets, right?"

Right after someone spits out those words a silence stretches itself across the room. Everyone slowly turns to the source of the voice to find a member of the DDA. The guy rests his sword over his shoulder and clears his throat.

"Say that again…" Twyla says as she gets up.

"Huh?" the player from the DDA says.

"Say that again, you bastard!" Twyla yells and jumps towards the guy.

I get hold of her hand as she is jumping at the guy and pull her back. Once she is right next to me I hold her arms and keep her close to me. She tries to break free but I make sure to keep her from doing so.

"It's not worth your time," I huff, "Come on…"

"Al!" Asuna shouts.

"What?!" I yell.

I turn to her to and see her pointing past me. Twyla stops struggling and as she does this I immediately soften my hold on her. My head turns slowly to where Asuna is pointing; I'm able to see the player from the DDA being held up in the air. Two shiny red gauntlets hold him; the fingers are slowly digging in into his skin.

"She told you to say it again," Aeri mutters softly.

"Let go off me!"

"No, hehe, no…no," Aeri struggles, "Say it again."

All the players around just stare at the unfolding scene, no one at all seems eager to step in. It pretty much was made clear that Aeri might as well be one of the strongest players on the clearing parties so it only seems logical that pretty much anyone would be scared to do something about the member of the DDA being choked in front of everyone. Even then, the DDA is not really a guild other players would defend.

"I'm waiting!" Aeri screams.

"Sh-she can just get another pet…right?"

"Hehe," Aeri cackles, "I'm also very sure that assholes aren't in short supply in this game, there's actually a surplus. So if your logic holds any ground….your guild can just get another one, right?"

Aeri's hands dig in deeper into the player's skin, everyone close enough can see how she starts hurting the guy. Her fingers leaving that red effect we all know so well. I can see her smiling, from ear to ear. This is bad.

I move Twyla out of the way and reach out to Aeri. I manage to set my hand over forearm and pull on her harshly. She immediately lets go of the guy and clamps her right hand around my arm. She lifts her left hand and makes an attempt to reach for my neck. I do my best to try and meet her hand with mine before she gets to my neck.

"Aeri!" I yell.

She stops.

"What?" she asks.

Her eyes slowly track the length of her arm, the one she was about to use to get a hold of my neck. She blinks rapidly for about two seconds and then drops her hand down to her side. Exhaling deeply she tightens her hands into fists and then relaxes them as if doing some sort of breathing exercise.

"Sorry," she mutters quietly.

"What was that?" I ask.

"I…uh.."

"Alright!" Klein yells, "Let's walk up those stairs and see what floor fifty five is all about!"

Asuna comes right behind me and starts pushing me along with Aeri.

"What are you doing?" I ask.

"You and your guild are going to be the first players on the next floor," she says.

"Huh? Why?" Aeri asks.

"Because your guild member killed the floor boss," Asuna explains, "It's just a little thing we've come up with."

I nod and then look for Esra in the crowd. Finally locating her I nod in her direction and speak.

"Get everyone behind us," I order quickly.

I'm still at a loss as Asuna pushes us up the stairs. It feels like this dumb, hazy state of mind, but despite doing my best I can't seem to get rid of it. Just the fact that seconds ago we had to go past the very monster that killed Edelweiss has me in a very upset state. Why not kill that thing as well? That damn wolf took our friend away, why does it get to live? We reach the end of the set of stairs that lead to floor fifty five. There is no door of any kind; the stairs just give way to a small tunnel. At the end I'm able to see a big city in the distance. After more than a year of small villages and towns, towering buildings appear to me as very rare sight.

Klein's guild stops and they make a small barrier in the tunnel. His red colored guild members now act as some kind of bouncers, no letting anyone through.

"Alright," Klein says, "Alshep! Get your guild over here!

Aeri leaves my side and walks through the members of the Fuurinkazan. Esra is quick to walk over to me and then past me. She holds Twyla close to herself, patting her back, doing her very best to comfort her. Sadly all of her efforts so far are to no avail. Aereth and Billfray follow Esra closely, not far behind them Hotoka and Siren trail them.

"I'll go back with Ruri," Kayla says, "We'll tell Elina and Sinna how it went."

"Yeah, right, thank you." I say.

"We'll see you soon," Ruri says with an uneasy smile.

"Take care," I say before going ahead of the people of Klein's guild.

The spiky haired samurai with the heart of gold put his hand over my shoulder as I walk past him. His look says it all. It says he is sorry; it's that kind of empathetic look you just have to glance at to feel a little better. It works; it really does, but if my whole life so far in this game has proven anything is that things never really take a turn for the good. Ever since day one it has all been a downhill trip to hell with short rests to only get my hopes up.

"We did the right thing…right?" I ask aloud.

"Master, ever since you started this guild, that's all you have ever done," Esra says.

I grind my teeth together, breathing out the air in my lungs slowly, trying to calm down. I know she means well, but for some dumb reason I have a hard time believing it. I have strived to do good for all of us, that much I know. That much I'm egotistical enough to admit, but, has it all been good? Have I been doing my best? Have I really been trying my hardest to do the right thing?

"Even if other people think otherwise…" Hotoka mutters, "At least we've been doing our best."

"Twyla?" I call.

"Yes?" she answer, her voice still broken.

I extend my hand to her and she reaches out for it. I pull her close to my side and walk with her towards the end of the tunnel. I cannot bring Edelweiss back, but at least I can keep pushing her forward, pushing us…forward.

"Let's go everyone," I say.

Aeri walks a little ahead of us, doing my best to keep Twyla moving is hard. Her body feels sluggish and tired, she doesn't want to move, and she wants to be left alone. I'm not about to do that, I'll stay by her side, I'll pull her back on her feet even if takes days.

Aeri, Twyla and I are the first players to step out into floor fifty five. As we do a loud metallic sound is heard behind us. I turn around to see that the exit of the tunnel has been blocked by metal bars. The rest of my guild is left trapped behind them along with the rest of the players in the clearing parties.

"What the hell is this?" Aeri snaps.

I softly let go of Twyla and make my way to now barred off tunnel. I grip the bars and in a silly attempt to do something I pull on them. They don't move an inch they are all too solid. What's happening is this a trap of some sort?

"I got a new quest…" Twyla mumbles.

"What do you mean a quest?" Klein questions form the other side.

I bring my menu down and I'm quickly prompted with a quest update.

"Defeat the Champions?" Aeri ponders, "What the hell is going on?"

Another quest like the one in the library, it feels eerily similar. I have a strong hunch that only completing it will open the bars behind me. What a way to welcome us to this floor. It's just too perfect…a hard task after an easy battle. The bastard that created this game just enjoys torturing us.

"Alshep what happened?" Klein asks as he finally pushes his way ahead of the crowd.

Not even wanting to answer I just knock the metal bars behind me with my hand. I lower my hand and take my sword out of its sheathe. The background music is starting to trail off into a really morbid tune and I just know something is about to happen. Aeri and Twyla do too and react just like me. Twyla already wields her katar and Aeri's hands are already shining as she steps back.

"We have to take out four champions…" I explain to Klein.

"Al!" Asuna yells.

I turn my head just slightly and see her pulling on the metal bars.

"Hey don't just stand there!" she screams, "Everyone try to get through!"

It's a times like this when you can really appreciate the rank Asuna is able to pull with the clearing parties. Not even a second after she screams out her orders players are already savagely beating the metal bars with their weapons while others pull on them with all their might.

"They're coming," Twyla says.

I didn't notice any sooner but just a few meters away three fully armored soldiers seem to be walking to be walking in our direction. From left to right they sport different armors the one detail they share is that nothing can be seen behind their visors, just black emptiness. Silver, Bronze and the last one is just covered with rust. The silver armored I'm not even sure if he is human, he towers above the other soldiers and wields a massive axe, the thing is twice the size of his already big head. The bronze one sports a shiny spear, he is still too far away for me to focus on details but the fact remains that his weapons is as shinny and clean as his whole set of armor. The last one, the rusty soldier holds and equally as oxidized sword and shield. Without any need of explanation I can only guess these are the champions we have to the defeat; however the quest lists four of them, yet only three present themselves.

"I'll take the guy with the axe," Aeri says.

"I'll go for the one with the spear," Twyla says.

"I got the rusty one then," I huff.

We move ahead at the same time, slowly fanning out to our respective targets. It will be better to take them one at a time instead grouping them together.

"Downfall," I mutter to myself.

I feel my sword get a bit heavy and the blade shines brightly as if it had been heated up. The orange-ish hue coming off from the sword is bright enough to blind me a little if I look down at the blade. The soldiers in what feels like a bad omen also fan out, ever so coincidentally each one moves to a different player each, they seem to have chosen us to fit our already established targets. The rusty soldier moves my way, he is bashing his sword against his shield making quite the fuzz for no apparent reason as he approaches me. I keep my sword close to my side but pointing downwards, don't want to do any sudden movements now, I need to get closer.

Aeri screams loudly as she engages in combat, she runs towards the silver soldier. The behemoth raises his arms in the air and tries to smash Aeri into the ground; she dodges to the side quickly and attacks the soldier, even if I'm a bit away all I can hear are Aeris's claws hitting metal. They clank loudly as if they were not even damaging the thing.

I finally position myself in a decent attack range and raise my sword above my head. I jump towards the rust soldier and slash down on him. He raises his shield in defense but my sword breaks through it. He switches quickly and meets my sword with his. I keep pushing, trying to get his sword out of the way to attack. We stare right at each other for a few seconds, I stare at that his vacant visor, no eyes, it looks like I'm fighting an empty armor but I hear something breathing, something grunting behind there. My hands tremble slightly as he overpowers me. With a heavy grunt he pushes me away and slashes at me getting a clean cut at my chest. My body recoils and I take a few steps back before regaining my stance.

"Alshep, look for openings in their armors!" Klein yells.

"Hit them hard!" someone else yells.

"Kill those things!"

"You can do it!"

The players behind us support us, even if they can't fight alongside us, they are here for us. The thought makes me smile; at the very least if I die it will be in a mildly heroic way.

"Master, come on, keep your guard up!" Esra screams.

"Go for the head!" Billfray exclaims.

"Yeah! Aeri, Twyla go for the head as well!" Hotoka shouts.

My guild, it seems like I forgot for a second. I smile once more and dig my hand into my pocket. I take out a healing crystal and keep it in my left hand. I ready up a skill with my other hand and lift my sword again. I can't die, not yet.

Twyla is pushed back but it takes mere seconds for her to raise her weapon again and attack the bronze soldier. She aims for his head but he quickly dodges before driving his spear clean through Twyla. Complaining, she grips the pole and pushes herself away before the soldier is able to deal more damage.

The rusty soldier approaches me once more and without putting the smallest amount of thought into it I run towards him and slash at him from the side, but he blocks. I step back and raise my sword in the air again to try an overhead strike. He blocks once more and then head-butts me. I can feel the rust scraping my forehead as he pushes his body forward. The soldier takes his sword back and drives it through my stomach. Once he does he relaxes his body, he thinks he has me right where he wants. He doesn't. I let go of my sword and with my unarmed skill hit him across his helmet. My hand shines briefly before punching the rust on his helmet. He barely budges but I can see his health going down with each strike. My health points go down as well but I activate the crystal in my left hand, completely healing myself and freeing up another hand to strike.

"Yeah!" the players cheer.

"What kind of skill is that?!"

"Steel and Swords!" they chant.

"Steel and Swords!"

"Steel and Swords!"

I feel my hands get a bit numb; hitting rust with your bare hands can't be a good thing, even in the virtual world. I drop the bastard's health to a quarter but he is yet to back away or retrieve his weapon from my body. I'm three or four punches away from killing him when he pushes me away, sliding his sword out of my gut in the process. I bend my body over quickly and pick up my sword to attack but by the time I straighten up again he kicks me with inhuman strength. I feel like I'm flying through the air and once I'm able to twist my body to place my feet on the ground I trip back slamming my back against the metal bars of the tunnel. My health is now lower than expected as it stands below fifty percent.

"Dammit," I grunt and get back up on my feet.

"Al!" Twyla yells as she turns around.

She runs towards me, forgetting about the enemy she was fighting. The bronze soldier takes a chance throws his spear towards Twyla.

"Turn around!" I scream.

The spear flies quickly through the air and after going through Twyla's leg it embeds itself on the ground. Twyla unwillingly bends a knee and finds herself trapped as she is unable to move.

I start making my way to her when the behemoth wearing the silver armor throws Aeri right at me. Unsure of what to do I spread my arms and try to catch her. The force with which she is thrown is too much for me to handle and once she reaches me I'm pushed back with her. Once again my back slams against the metal bars only this time I cushion to blow for Aeri.

"Come on! Get up!" I order.

"Yeah, hang on…" she grunts.

Once she moves out of the way I see the soldier in rusty armor run to Twyla. They isolated one of us, dammit. I take Aeri's hand and use it to the spring myself up, once I do I run again to Twyla. She uses her katar to parry a few strikes from the sword wielding soldier. The last hit sends her own weapon flying away and the only thing she is left with to shield herself are her arms. She raises her arms trying to shield her face from the next attack but the soldier's sword cuts both of them with a single strike.

"No!" she cries, "Get away!"

"Dammit move!" Aeri says as she pushes me away.

The silver soldier slowly steps in front of Twyla and swings his massive axe at her head. I can see Aeri running as fast as she is able to in order to stop it. The blade of the axe reaches Twyla's neck before Aeri is able to get there. I keep running, hoping there's something I can do. I'm just fooling myself though.

Twyla's body shatters and Aeri bellows all kinds of profanity before jumping up in the air.

"Bloodlust!" she screams.

She comes down on top the silver knight like a fiery red comet. She stands atop his shoulder pads and slowly starts tearing the soldier apart. Piece by piece until nothing is left of him. She rips him apart with little resistance; the sound of metal being bent is heard briefly before she snaps bits and pieces of the soldier. About half the soldier is left when the body disappears, making Aeri he victor of that trade.

I feel my sword vibrate and go for the soldier in rust. I faint at him and once he raises his sword I lower mine to hit his legs. With a clean swipe I make him fall on the ground, seconds after I step over his chest and drive my sword right through his visor, killing him.

Dammit we were so close. She just needed to be careful; I just need to be more careful.

I drop my sword and walk alongside Aeri towards the final target. The spearman with the bronze armor. Aeri bends over and in an animalistic way dashes towards the soldier, she grabs his leg and with a few harsh pulls she detaches it from his kneecap. She stands up straight and I can see how she is struggling to breathe, bright red scars are all over her face and body. She breathes out slowly and the gauntlets revert to their original form. I reach the soldier and bend down to grab his chest plate. I pull on it and once his face is close enough I punch him back into the ground. After I punch him a second time it starts to rain. I stop at the sudden cold feeling of the drops of rain.

"How fucking appropriate…" Aeri mumbles.

The soldier is not even struggling anymore it's like he has accepted his fate. My knuckles hurt a little, but I keep punching the metal helmet with all my strength. Tired I pull on the bastard once more and bring my arm as back as I'm physically able to. I let go and punch the soldier into the dirt, my fist slips through as his body disappears and my knuckles hit the cold, wet ground.

"We still need to find and kill another one…" I mutter.

"The quest tracker says we should find him in the city," Aeri answer.

"We'll head there then," I say and stand up.

"Hey…" Asuna calls out

I turn my sight the bars, she sticks her hand out through them as she holds two healing crystals.

"Take these," she says.

"Come on," Aeri says as she walks with me.

As we approach the bars the players from the other side stick out their hands as well, each one of them holds out an item or two. Potions, bombs, crystals, knives are all being offered to me and Aeri. I reach Asuna and take the Crystals out of her hand.

"Thank you," I mutter, doing my very to not even raise my sight from the floor.

I walk to the right, picking up the potions and items other players offer. All the way until I reach Esra, I don't even have to look up to recognize her. The frilly ends of her outfit are more than enough to know it's her.

"Master…" she mumbles

"I've failed you again…" I say.

"You didn't," she says and reaches out for my hands.

She pulls them close to her and puts different crystals in my hands. Healing ones and antidote ones. I store them in my inventory and as I'm about to walk away Siren pulls me close to the bars.

"I…I…I got these..." she cries and sets even more healing crystals in my hands.

She is crying and moving so desperately it makes my heart break. She is digging through her pockets and inventory trying hard to find things to give me, something that will aid me.

"Also these….and…and," she stops after putting a handful of knives in my right hand and just holds it tight, "Don't…don't die!"

"They won't," Aereth comments.

I nod at him and finish putting everything Siren gave me into my inventory.

"We'll look for the floor's gate," I announce, "Maybe then you guys can move up…since this damn bars won't go away."

"I'll stay here with my guild," Klein says, "Just in case this opens up."

"Thanks, man," I say, "Esra, take everyone home."

"But master…"

"You take everyone home and stay with them, keep them safe," I order.

She nods and I turn away from the bars. Aeri stares at me with vacant eyes, drenched top to bottom because of the falling rain. Once she sees I'm walking her way she turns around as well and leads me further into floor fifty five. We walk in complete silence for about ten minutes before she stops. The landscape of this floor is very different from the ones below, it looks flat and barren, if I focus hard enough while looking behind us I can still make out the tunnel that emerges from the dungeon on the floor below. The only thing taller than the city in the distance is a huge mountain to the west. Other than that it feels like we are crossing a barren wasteland.

"Maybe we should take a break, gather our thoughts…" I propose.

"Yeah…sure," Aeri says, "There's like a hut or something over there."

She points ahead in the distance to what looks like a rundown hut. I nod at her and we make our way to it through the pouring rain. Once we reach it I step inside, the roof is thankfully intact so going inside will at least shield us from the rain. A few barrels are stacked on the back of the small hut leaving very little space for us to be in. I sit down on the floor and lean my back against the barrels, the space being so restricted that I have to stick my feet out into the rain. Aeri does the same and sits next to me.

We stare into the distance, watching the rain splash against the dirt in the ground. I try to think about other things but as it has come to be the usual occurrence I just focus harder on the bad things. That is until I hear a soft chuckle coming from Aeri. I raise an eyebrow and turn my head to her. She is chuckling as she stares at the falling rain. Her chuckling goes from soft and quiet to all out laughing in a matter of seconds. It's different from before, it doesn't look maniacal at all it looks disturbingly genuine. She even takes a few seconds to breathe in as she is finding herself without air from all the laughing.

"Why are you laughing?" I ask, feeling very uncomfortable.

"Hehe…ahahaha, it's just, ahahaha, it's just funny, you know?"

"What is?" I ask angrily, "Just what about this is funny to you?"

She laughs soundly for a few more seconds before answering. She takes her sweet time in calming herself down and without any trace of laughter or just really anything else in her voice she replies.

"Just, you know, how people keep dying when we are together," she says.

I'm unable to generate any kind of response; I just stare at her inhumanly blank expression.

"It doesn't really happen otherwise," she says softly, "When Daath and Kato died, we were together."

She barely finishes her sentence and she is already laughing again.

"When…hahaha…when," she stops herself as she is unable to continue due to her laughter, "When Owl and Regi died, we were together."

"Aeri…stop…" I mutter.

When I plead her to stop she just starts laughing louder, bending her body to grab her own stomach as she is unable to stop.

"And now Twyla and her stupid pet lizard are dead!" she laughs, "And we were together for that too! Ahahaha! Who do you think is gonna be next?"

"Dammit, just shut up," I huff, "What's happening to you?"

"I'm fucking losing my mind that's what!" she yells, "It all just keeps happening, it keeps getting worse and worse! Shut up! Shut up!"

I back away from her feeling rather scared as she switches between screaming and laughing. She holds her own head and closes her eyes before rocking back and forwards.

"Tell her to shut up Al!" she cries, "Tell her to shut up!"

"Who…what are you talking about?!" I ask as I stand up.

She slowly lies on her side and curls up into fetal position. She keeps holding her head with her hands with such force that her expression turns into a pained one.

"Tell her to shut up!" she bellows.

Afraid is a word that I don't think I use lightly. Scary things poke a very primal spot in every single person it's a feeling everyone has had more than healthy serving of. It's a feeling nobody likes, it's a feeling that makes you uncomfortable and weary of your surroundings. When someone makes you afraid it feels like a whole different thing, because that's when fear takes a physical form. I feel fear as I stare down at Aeri, she is screaming nonsense and crying like a small child, yet I don't know what's afflicting her. What in the hell am I even supposed to do in situation like this?

Scared, broken, afraid, confused, that's all I'm feeling right now.

"Help me…" she says softly.

"Aeri, just tell me what's wrong," I say cautiously, "What's happening?"

She stares at me with teary eyes, trembling lips and a tired expression.

"Please help me."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I know I haven't made a long chapter in a bit but these are like usual length if you ask me. Or at least the words are around the average I used to write when I started...kind of haha. Well Happy New Year everyone! I'm currently posting this from a horrible internet connection at the hotel I'm staying at! I hate the sun, I was dragged to a beach, you can only imagine how that went. Also YEAH Aeri is finally losing it! You might think I'm crazy for being excited about this but I've been wanting to get to this point for so long!

**Electric Ink 0: **I'm so sorry for doing what I did in this chapter. Also I like Midna a lot but I never thought to see Twyla in that light, haha. **Devilparrot: **Yeah a giant lizard is too cool for canon, haha but remember I am taking some liberties with actual timeline in this arc but as always I will try not to actually disrupt it! **IC0: **Apologies if this chapter also feels short, I'll work on length. Billfray does own a scythe, it is actually the one he offered to Aeri after beating the boss on the chapter called "Mass Redemption"

That's all for today! If you like what you please leave a review! I know you like my awful writing come on. Haha if you don't like it also leave your opinion or something. I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Bedlam"


	57. Chapter 57 - Bedlam

**Chapter 57: Bedlam**

**February/5th/2024**

**Fifty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Granzam Outskirts**

**Aeri**

"You are like a fucking poison to the livelihood of your friends!" Mirai titters, "As long as you are with them they are all going to die!"

Why am I laughing? Why the hell am I laughing? What the hell is so damn funny?

"And now Twyla and her stupid pet lizard are dead!" I laugh, "And we were together for that too! Ahahaha! Who do you think is gonna be next?"

Mirai's words slipping into my own had happened before but it is only getting worse. Her voice resonates with my own more often with each passing day, I'm losing myself. I'm losing, I'm losing it.

"Easy there, the crazy is showing," Mirai mocks.

She's right; the crazy's been there all along, the thing is that so far I had managed to keep it inside. Now it's coming out; I can't hold it in anymore. I'm scared, I'm shaking, stop. God dammit please stop it.

"Dammit, just shut up," Al huffs, "What's happening to you?"

My head is a mess of ideas, noises, words, images, sentences, everything. Everything is just so messed up, it's convoluted. It hurts, it hurts, I can't think straight. Say something, just say something.

"I'm fucking losing my mind that's what!" I yell, "It all just keeps happening, it keeps getting worse and worse!"

"Now that's just great!" Mirai laughs, "You are weak and stupid, at least try to hold it together!"

I am weak. I am stupid. I'm not holding it together.

"Shut up! Shut up!" I cry.

Al backs away from me; he looks confused and kind of shocked. Why wouldn't he be? I can hear Mirai's voice annoyingly echo in my head. She is laughing at me, mocking me. I can see her shadowy, blurry figure standing in the rain, she points at me as she laughs. I'm breaking…I'm breaking. I reach for my own head with my arms and hold it tight, trying to fool myself, thinking that the pressure will somehow block her out.

"Tell her to shut up Al!" I bawl, "Tell her to shut up!"

"Who…what are you talking about?!" he asks and stands up.

I've finally done it; all this time trying to keep the lid closed, it's all flooding out now and I can't do anything about it. I feel a knot in my throat, a void in my stomach, a sharp pain in the back of my head. It won't stop, it just won't stop. Al moves a few steps away; he appears to be more comfortable under the rain than next to me. Who would be comfortable close to me anyways? Only one person ever was. Feeling the urge to lie down I slump on my side and curl into a little ball. I hold my head tighter and tighter, I might just be hurting myself at this point but I want her to stop talking, I want her to shut up.

"Good job, good job at keeping your shit together," Mirai mocks, "What are you gonna do after this? Gonna keep hanging out with your best pal over there? Oh! Maybe then you can manage to get that whole guild killed. Maybe the maid will be next, or that bisexual pervert! Oh, imagine if the little girl dies next! Wouldn't that be a load off your back?!"

"Tell her to shut up!" I scream

I grunt and groan; I tighten my hands over my head and then for good measure hit myself a few times with them. She is not going away. She is not leaving me alone.

"Woah, what are you doing?" Mirai asks, "You have such a pretty face, don't go hurting yourself now."

Tears fall down my cheeks I can feel them track their way down my face. Why won't she leave? Why won't she shut up already? I'm so done, I can't handle it on my own, not anymore. In pain I turn my body to Al and slowly open my eyes. He's worried; I've seen that look in his face a thousand times.

"Help me…" I say softly.

"You don't get to ask for help!" Mirai screams.

Her blurred figure disappears and within a second reappears right in front of my face. I can feel her close to my face. Her presence, it feels heavy and uncomfortable like she is literally taking the air away from me. I'm drowning. I try to contort my body even further curling even more, digging my nails into my head.

"No, you can't be helped," she says, "You are broken beyond repair. You don't get to ask for help!"

I close my eyes tightly and that heavy feeling disappears, I open them again and look at him. Al keeps looking at me as I throw my little fit of nonsense but his stare changes. He no longer looks confused or like he's seen a freak, he looks at me with compassion. Another look I've seen on his face a thousand times.

"Aeri, just tell me what's wrong," he says slowly, "What's happening?"

I whimper and press my lips harshly against each other. My lips tremble and I choke on my own words.

"Please help me."

He kneels right in front of me and with his arms reaches out to me. He places his hands over my side and holds me still for a bit. A part of me thinks he doesn't know what he is doing but the fact alone that he is trying to do something makes me feel so much more at ease.

"I…I need to know what's wrong," he says softly.

"Just help me…please…please," I cry.

I can't even properly ask for help. It's not like there's set of steps he needs to follow in order to help. I don't know what to tell him. I cry and plead like a baby who doesn't know how to do anything else, waiting for someone else to take care of my troubles, to make me feel better. Help me. Please just help me.

Carefully he props me up from my pathetic position and makes me lean against the barrels. My tears cloud my vision so much I can barely see him in front of me. His hands grasp my own and battling my own stiffness he manages to bring them down to my lap. He holds them there for a while, not doing anything else.

"Who exactly do I tell to shut up?" he asks.

"Yeah, tell him," Mirai mutters, "I'm sure that will help you out, telling the one person that doesn't hate you that you really are a nutcase. Go on."

"Her…" I whimper.

He wipes my tears off my eyes and looks around slowly. I don't even know what to say next, he must be confused, but I'm done with this whole situation. I have to tell someone at least and if it's going to be anyone I would want that person to be him. I'll tell the one person that has stuck to my side, even when we had our differences, I'll tell him. I can only tell him.

"Where…uh is she?" he says.

My hand goes up from my lap, shaking, and I point right in front of me. I adjust a little to point behind him. Mirai stares at me with narrow eyes, her hands clenched into fists. It doesn't look like she wants to say anything further, but she is definitely mad.

Al looks over his shoulder; he takes a bit to inspect the area behind him and then turns to me again.

"I see," he says and stands up.

He turns his body around; he is practically staring at Mirai. She makes it a point to stare right back at him, her expression grows restless and then she starts talking again.

"What is he even going to do, huh?" Mirai asks, "Let me remind yo-"

"Shut up," Al says firmly.

His words make me feel relieved; Mirai barely finishes her sentence when she shuts her mouth. Irked she crosses her arms and in a few seconds vanishes from sight. I feel clarity for the first time in a long while. Her presence completely disappears from the air. I stand up quickly, surprised and a bit confused I walk over to Al.

"Yo…you saw her?" I ask, "You heard her?"

"No," he replies, "But you told me to tell her to shut up, so I did."

Figures…I am crazy. I guess deep inside I have known that fact for quite a while already. Al uttering those two words just lifts an incredible load off my head. Was that all I needed? Did I just need someone to help me with all of this? With my fingers I move a bit of my soaking wet hair out of my brow and swallow my own spit. I finally did it; he knows I'm not all there in the head. I hold my own hands together and clear my throat.

"Is she quiet now?" he asks.

Turning around and calmly looking for Mirai I can't seem to find her.

"She…she is gone," I say softly.

"Good," he says and turns my way, "Are you ok?"

"I don't know," I say, choking.

* * *

I tried my best at explaining Al what has been happening, during the whole conversation he looked doubtful, but even then I feel like he believes me. He looks at me differently now, that hint of compassion is still there but it feels different, he's never looked at me like this before. I been trying to figure it out for a while now but I just can't. It feels nice in a way, the way he looks at me feels…nice. Even if he is just lying for my sake, pretending to understand or to care...it had been a while since someone did that for me.

"So, she is like there sometimes, but then isn't?" he ponders as he adjusts his bracers.

I simply nod and he sighs. I understand the situation all too well even with my head not exactly being in the right place. I know when something is wrong. When something isn't the way it should be. I know something is happening to me, I just don't know what it is, I can't control it, and I don't know how it works. It's terrifying and I have been trying to deal with it all on my own.

"It's ok if you don't believe…" I mumble.

We stay silent for a bit, the sound of rain around us grows louder as we aren't chatting anymore. I've never seen it pour so hard in any other floor, it feels unnecessarily intense. It may have something to do with the quest; it may be setting the mood for this fight against another champion. It's funny, what would really make for awesome setting for a fight just turns out rather annoying and unsettling when it isn't really a game anymore.

"No, I do…it's just, I guess I'm can't really comment on it, you know? I'm not sure how I could help…"

"But…you did," I stammer, "You helped me right now, somehow…I don't know what happened, she is gone…for now at least."

"What do you mean for now?"

"She, uh, sometimes disappears for a while."

He nods and scratches the back of his head as he breathes out. He is taking this all too well; to the point it annoys me a little. I feel happy that he is trying to understand, that he is not running away from me or calling me crazy or anything. It truly makes me happy but at the same time, it wasn't the reaction I was expecting at all. He swipes his menu down and opens a message; I lean over a little and notice that it's from Elina. She is worried about him and in what I'm able to read from my angle she is torn that Twyla died. Is she worried about me at all? Is she only worried about him? I shake my head and then stare at a small puddle that formed not far from the hut. I find myself mesmerized by the ripples drops of rain make over it.

"It's been going on for a while right?" he says, "You have been acting strange for a while now."

"Strange?" I ask, fearing what he might answer.

"Well, how you kill people comes to mind…" he says "You are too comfortable with that."

I feel a weird itch in my body all of the sudden and look away before I answer.

"They deserve it though…" I spit.

"I partially agree," he says, "Bu-"

"Don't be a fucking hypocrite Al," I seethe, "You've also killed them, without a second thought sometimes."

"But how many have you killed?" he asks, "Maybe…maybe it has something to do with that."

He is trying to connect the dots in a really odd way. If I knew what caused this to begin with I wouldn't be having trouble with it. I know what might stop it, I know what will bring me peace and I fucked it up a while ago. I should've killed Klaus in that cave, I should've torn his head off, maybe then I would've gotten some closure, I would've gotten what I wanted.

I refuse to answer and just stare off into the distance.

"I really don't know what I can do to help Aeri…" he says, "I'm not sure I even understand what's really happening to you. You are angry or mad all the time lately, the short fuse it took to set you off has just gotten shorter and shorter and the only moment when you seem to be focused is when you are fighting or following up on something from the Laughing Coffin."

"What about right now?" I ask, "I'm focused right now."

"Well yeah but…" he pauses, "I just found out you've been seeing things…this…girl or something like some hallucination. I really don't fucking know how I should be reacting to this."

"I already told you, you helped me right now," I explain, "I don't know how but you did something."

He stands up and sighs yet again.

"I'm not always gonna be there…" he says, "and even then, how do I know something like this will work another time. We…we should really find this last champion."

A part of me wishes he didn't say that. What if he being there for me is all I need? What if he could always be there for me? The one obstacle in that situation would be Elina I guess. I shake my head and rest my hands over my knees.

"Right…right," I mutter.

I stand up myself and walk past Al. It would be dumb to deny that I'm not a bit upset, but then again it's not like we can stay here talking forever, for all we know this floor could be blocked until we kill the last champion.

"Come on, don't be like that," Al groans, "We can talk all you want later, but first we need to get back to the others."

"Yeah, whatever," I huff.

"Aeri, come on!" he says as he grabs my arm.

I pull away and mange to get away from his grasp.

"We are wasting time," I pout.

I feel particularly light, but all the rain has made every inch of my armor and body wet. My armor feels odd and the way everything is brushing against my skin just feel icky. I want to get this over with and at the same time I want to discuss it further with Al. I have a lingering feeling that my problems aren't even half done but I will need to keep Al closer to me in the future if I want to keep a slightly level head. The dirt road we walk gives way to large metal plates that seem to be held together with rivets. My boots and Al's make a clanking sound against the hard surface as we make our approach to the big city with tall metal towers.

"Granzam," Al says,

"What?"

"This place is called Granzam," he says, "Quest tracker updated…we should be looking further into this city."

I bring down my menu to check on what he says. The information has in fact updated and now it's just a matter of finding the champion and killing him. We are not even in the city yet and I get a feeling of being back in Tokyo. The towers of black still are just huge, after months of buildings with three or four floors seeing something tower mightily in the sky makes me feel…nostalgic. This place already looked huge from the entrance to this floor and being a few minutes of walking away from it just make it feel that much bigger.

"You can't get rid of me," I hear behind me.

With a chill running deep down my spine I turn around only to see Al walking behind me.

"You say something?" I ask.

"No," he mutters, "You heard something?"

I look around frantically but come up with nothing. Mirai is nowhere to be found yet.

"I thought I did…" I mumble, "Forget it, sorry."

A few minutes of walking put us in the streets of Granzam, the floor still consists of massive metal plates. The buildings also seem to be made of metal, some kind of black metal to be precise. It feels absurdly modern but it manages to still feel like a fantasy setting. A giant city made of only black metal.

"Do you think the gate is even in this city?" I ask.

"Must be, I didn't see any other settlements," he states, "And that mountain on the other end seems like a stretch."

We make a right turn as the street come to an end and see a massive like plaza. Even from where we stand we are able to see the teleport gate of this floor and ever so conveniently a knight in black armor stands next to it. He doesn't seem to notice us, but it would seem we have found our last champion. His armor is shiny and the same tone as the buildings of this city.

"Huh, I will admit he is a bit cool looking," Al says as he unsheathes his sword.

"Yeah, he goes with the theme of the city at least," I joke.

Al chuckles slightly and his sword shines a bright shade of green. I bring down my menu and equip Cain &amp; Abel. I stretch out my fingers, opening and closing my hands in a rhythm. Walking slowly and cautiously we make our approach. We are trying to wage in what range the last champion will become aggressive. We keep getting closer and closer and when we are but a few feet away, shiny red eyes make themselves present inside that black helmet of his. He reaches behind his back with both hands and swings two sickles back in front of him. On his back I can see a bastard sword, seems to be attached to his back. We all stand still for a few seconds; the rain around us completely overpowers the background music as it grows stronger. The single drops of rain are now falling hard enough to make the metal plates below our feet sing.

"Are you sure you are up for this?" Al asks.

"I thought you said I only focused when fighting," I tease.

"Fair enough," he smiles.

The last champion of Granzam runs towards me and attacks with both of his sickles. I push one away but the second manages to slash me right in the torso. I jump back and releasing a skill I jump back in to chip away at his armor. My fingers make contact with his sturdy armor and I feel them glide over his chest plate.

"Switch!" I yell and jump out of the way,

Al jumps in from the side and attacks the champion's legs. This makes him stagger a bit; raising his sword again Al takes the small window of opportunity and uses an overhead attack to get more damage in. Before his sword even makes contact with the champion's armor he raises his weapons and stops Al's sword with his sickles. Holding Al's sword in between the sickles it becomes easy for the champion to pull Al's weapon away. Al's sword flies briefly through the air before falling on the floor.

"Shit, switch!" Al says as he steps back, "I'll go get my sword."

"Right!" I huff, "I got this don't worry."

I roll forwards and as soon as I'm back on my feet I throw myself at the champion. I grab his wrists and struggle a bit to push him back. Using all my strength I raise his arms over his head and head-butt his helmet. It barely does any damage but it helps me get closer. The champion chuckles and head-butts me back. The hit pushes me back a bit but I tighten my grips on his wrists.

"No one has been able to take me on," the champion laughs, "What makes you think you are the exception?"

It always makes me feel uncomfortable when NPCs talk so directly to you. Be it vendors, inn keeper or enemies. It's personal, too personal, I don't like it. Adjusting my vision behind the champion I see all with his sword at the ready, running straight for the champion's back.

"Switch!" I grunt as I push him away.

Al stabs his sword right through the champion's armor.

"Hehe, I love that passive skill," Al laughs.

Al pulls his sword out and the swings it at the champion's head. This time the sword bounces of the plating but the hit manages to take a bit of health away from the enemy. The champion holds his head for a second and then attacks Al. The very end of one of his sickles gets Al so the champion pulls him close. Al stumbles towards the champion and tries to defend himself. The champion lowers his hand and turns the sickles' ends up before throwing his arms up with incredible strength. In the process the champion impales Al in both of his weapons and lifts him up in the air. Al groans in pain but within the second is swinging his sword at the champion as he tries to break free.

"Leave him alone!" I scream.

I jump at the champion's back and clamp my hands down around his helmet. I start pulling away with all my strength, we need to make a breach in this armor otherwise we will not be getting anywhere.

"Off of me!" the champion shouts before swing his head back.

I manage to pull the helmet off as he pushes me away. Al also breaks free and jumps back to use a healing crystal, getting all of his health back. The champion seems to be human under all the armor, unlike his partners. He is an old man with hair as white as snow and an equally as white beard. His eyes still have that shiny that devilish shade of red.

"Catch!" Al says as he throws a crystal my way.

Raising my hand to grab it leaves my side exposed and the champions wastes no time in driving the sickles right on my side. Ever so coincidentally he stabs right on the parts of my body that are exposed with no armor. The old man yanks me in his direction and being unable to just free myself I'm forced in the direction he pulls.

"I will show you what the champion of Granzam is capable of!" he yells.

"Stop talking!" I grunt and grab his hands.

Clawing desperately at them I grab and pull, hoping that I will be able to tear some more armor off like I did with the helmet. Al approaches from behind the champion but anticipating Al's intrusion the champion swings me around to put me in Al's way. Al lowers his sword as he realizes attacking with me on the way isn't going to help much.

"Use the crystal now," Al orders.

"What for?" I ask.

"Just do it," he insists.

I activate the crystal and in the corner of my eye see Al striking the fuse of a bomb alight. Dammit. He throws the bomb in my direction and I see it slam against the champion's side before going off. I feel the heat of the blast right in my face and I also feel how the champion slides his weapons out of my side. The smoke of the blast is not even gone and Al pulls me back on my feet, placing another crystal in my hands. I activate it quickly and watch my health rise from yellow all the way back to green.

"We need to destroy his armor," Al says.

"Yeah, no shit…" I huff, "I could use Bloodlust but it will draw on my health faster."

"We have a lot of crystals, want to give that a try?" he proposes.

"How many?"

"Around nine," he says.

I nod and he gives me one after the other and I store them in my inventory, keeping one in my left hand. I reach for my neck and activate bloodlust. I shiver at the burning sensation all over my body and smile a little. The champion comes charging out of the smoke and I dash quickly past him. As I go along his side I tear a piece away of his leg armor.

"I'll try to distract him, you keep ripping his armor apart," Al says.

A few seconds have passed and my health is already reaching the middle mark. I use the crystal and take another one out of my inventory. Al starts trading blows with the champion, he is being a bit reckless about it but that is granting him speed to attack, leaving the champion with no other option but to try and parry his attacks. I clamp my hand down on the champions back and with a single pull destroy half of the plate protecting his back.

"I will not fall!" the champion bellows and turns around, elbowing me in the face.

The sheer strength of the hit sends me to the ground but I roll away to be able to stand up safely. As I stand up and with the champion facing my way Al is able to stab his sword in the opening I made. The champion stumbles forward and flails his weapons behind him to attack Al. Al retrieves his sword and stands a few feet back.

The champion drops his sickles on the ground and reaches behind his head for the bastard sword. He swings the massive blade in front of him as if the thing barely had any weight to it and stares right at me with an angry frown.

I activate the crystal in my hand and repeat the process of taking another out of my inventory. The champion swings his sword vertically and completely misses me as I step away. However a shockwave pushes me back sending me flying to a nearby building. I crash into the wall and land back on my feet, with barely any health left I activate yet another crystal.

"The sword has an area of effect attack!" I warn Al.

He nods and starts throwing knives at the champion, trying to get his attention. The champion turns his attention to Al and jumps in the air. Practically flying, the champion reaches Al and also attacks him in a similar manner like when he attacked me. I run and jump as well aiming for the champion I fall close to him and as he is swinging his sword at me I dodge to the side and manage to tear one of his bracers off before being thrown by the massive shockwave of his sword. This time I fall on the ground and grunt as I get back on my feet. I consume another crystal and drop it on the floor.

"I'm going through these things way too fast!" I yell.

"Hang in there, we almost got him!" Al yells as he approaches the enemy.

Al swings his sword to meet the champion's. Both blades clash against each other and a gust of wind surges through the whole plaza, almost pushing me back in the process. Al somehow stays his ground and tries to overpower the champion's swing.

"Cut his arm off!" I yell

Instead of overpowering the swing Al slides his sword down to the champion's hands and just by sliding his blade down cuts his hand off. The old man barely flinches and kicks Al out of his way. Not minding his handicap one little bit he swings the sword over his back with a single working arm.

"You'll have to try harder!" the champion yells.

I run at the old man and use another crystal, this time I don't bother to get another ready. I activate a skill and feel my right hand vibrate as I draw myself closer. Thanks to the wet floor I skip a little and slide the remaining distance to the champion. He swings his sword at my left side but I stop it with my left hand. I pull my right hand back and punch the center of his chest plate. I make a small crack and with my left hand barely holding the blade in place I push it down and in the brief seconds I have with both of my hands rip his chest plate apart. The massive blade cuts my left leg clean off but I throw body back before the blade has a chance to cut anything else.

My back slams on the floor followed closely by my head. I deactivate bloodlust and crawl back as fast as I can.

"His chest plate is gone!" I say.

"Right," Al nods, "I got this."

He jumps over me and with a shining sword tries to hit the old man in the chest. The champions parries Al's attack and then retaliates with a quick swing, Al also parries and in a bit of a dirty move jams a throwing knife in the old man's chest. This makes him groan in a bit of pain as he bring his weapon back to his side. Al pulls his sword back and with a quick movement stabs his sword right through the champion's chest.

The champion let's go of his sword and kneels right in front of Al. Al pulls his sword out and takes a step back.

"You bested me…" the old man coughs, "Impo-"

"Oh shut the hell up…" Al grumbles and cuts the champion's head off, interrupting his dying speech.

**-Quest Clear-**

Al sheathes his sword and makes his way over to me. As I half expected in a way the rain stops completely and a bit of sunlight begins shining into the city. He offers his hand and pulls me up.

"I'll help you walk," he says.

"Thanks," I huff as I rest a bit of my weight on him.

He grabs my right arm and throws it around his neck.

"That enemy is the biggest load of bullshit I have ever fought…" I chuckle.

"Yeah, hell, any AoE attack is bullshit no matter the game," Al replies.

We wobble our way to the teleport gate which is inactive as of now. We take a minute or so of a breather just to stare at it. It feels like a remarkable achievement, we'll be the ones letting the players below into this new floor. I should be excited but everything that transpired so far makes me feel uneasy and embarrassed, I wonder what Al will do with what I told him today.

"Al…" I mutter, "About what I sai-"

"I won't tell anyone, but I would rather not discuss it further today," he says, "Let's talk more tomorrow…ok?"

"Sure, yeah, sorry," I mutter.

"Don't be, it's ok," he says and stares at the gate panel, "Will you do the honors?"

I nod and reach out to the panel, activating the gate itself. As soon as the thing pops up the floor selection menu the new floor starts getting flooded with players. They yell in excitement, others run in different directions, taking in the sights of the new floor.

"Al, Aeri!" Asuna exclaims.

She barely is done teleporting into this floor and she is already in front of us.

"You guys did it!" she says

"Yeah, we did," I chuckle.

"We need to celebrate!" Asuna says, "This is a big achievement, may-"

"We are heading home," Al states.

Asuna's excitement dies down quickly and she nods at Al.

"Sorry, we'll celebrate later, ok?" he says

"Yeah, I'm sorry," Asuna replies, "You both take care, alright?"

We both nod at the sub leader of the KoB and head back home.

* * *

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

Mood was at an all-time low when we got back. There was nothing that could be done sadly. Al was kind enough to carry me all the way to my room. He felt gloomy, I won't hold it against him, today was a horrible day, probably for everyone.

Staring right into the ceiling I sigh and unequip my current armor. My underwear is relatively dry when compared to everything else I was wearing. I intertwine my own fingers and rest my hands over my stomach. I start relaxing when the heaviness returns, but this time it feels a thousand times heavier.

"You do not get rid of me!" Miria growls as she places herself on top of me.

I flinch and try to push her away besides knowing very well I can in no way interact physically with her. I whimper away from her but she keeps getting closer. My back is already flat against the headboard of my bed and with no more room to cower away she places her damn face inches away from mine.

"I will always be here," she huff, "You will NEVER get rid of me, get that? NEVER!"

My eyes water immediately and I cover my ears with my hands.

"Go away, go away…" I cry, "Leave me alone…."

I knew it was too good to be true, even if it was Al, there's no way he could just swoop in and solve all my trouble. What a stupid thing to think. I really am broken. Mirai begins to laugh and backs away from me a little.

"You are weak. You are stupid…" she says.

"I'm not holding it together…" I sob.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

A bit late on this update but I'm here! I really cannot put into words how proud I am of the very first of this chapter. It might be a bit egotistical to feel so proud about it but they way the dialogue and Aeri's rambling works in the very beginning of this chapter I just loved it, it just feels right. Also, I really liked the fight with the last champion and like with Aeri's boss fight I listened to one song on repeat for about 2 hours and I just think it helped me infuse the fight scene with what it needed. So if you want to feel a little bit of extra intensity listen to the full version OP of "Gundam: Iron Blooded Orphans" called "Raise Your Flag" or just listen to it and reflect on the fight scene cause I think it fits.

A guest was kind enough to communicate that reviews were kind of screwed but they got fixed a few days after he informed me of this. SO I will able to do this review commentary like I've been doing thankfully haha. **SkySlash9: **Yeah I will be honest I had written a less hardcore way for Twyla to die but then I consulted a friend and he proposed to make it more brutal. **IC0: **You've been around since the very beginning you know you are strapped in for a roller coaster of emotions haha. I certainly hope you fail no math tests, I personally suck at it but best of luck to you! **Electronic Ink 0: **I truly apologize to any Twyla fans but some things just need to happen. I will also apologize for future stuff because things will need to keep happening. (Everyone interpret this however you want, muahaha!)

AH, so vacations came to a close all of the sudden. I go back to Uni tomorrow and I'm crying myself to sleep tonight as I assume is common to do. I was not able to finish writing Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds over this break BUT I am close! It saddens me in a way, but it is also feeling very fulfilling! Remember though we still got a bit of ways to go since I write chapters with advance. So stick around, we are getting there! ALSO CAN ANYWAY SAY 300,000+ WORDS HYPE! As always if you like what you read please leave a review, if you don't do so as well, criticism is always good I guess. Or be completely vague and odd like a guest called "what the" who recently left a review in my very first chapter saying "fuck". Clever, I really like that guy and not knowing what he meant by that will forever haunt my dreams! I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "The Little Things"


	58. Chapter 58 - The Little Things

**Chapter 58: The Little Things**

**February/22nd/2024**

**First Floor of Aincrad - Tolbana**

**Elina **

It took me quite a while to convince Aeri to let me drag Sinna all the way to this floor. Aeri refuses for a very valid reason, but Sinna begged me to bring her with me. Ever since we lost Twyla to this game Sinna has been insisting on going back to the Monument of Life, and leave everyone we've lost in the way something special. Something to let us remember them fondly.

"This is stupid," Aeri pouts.

Then again, it was never in my intentions to drag her along as well. I can understand why Aeri doesn't want to go back to that place. It brings up bad memories, something she would rather forget. Sinna's idea is an innocent and good willed one, but going to that slab with names is just something Aeri would rather not do.

"It isn't!" Sinna complains.

"I would've taken care of Sinna," I say, "You didn't need to come along."

"I wanted to spend the day with her…" Aeri mutters.

"Then spend it with her, by doing what she wants to do today," I says softly, hoping Sinna doesn't hear me.

Aeri slowly blows air out through her nose as she looks away. She is so childish sometimes but I guess that's one of the things I like about her, she's always been that way after all. Everything from the way she blows air though her nose when she doesn't want to say anything to getting angry when she is embarrassed, and her now widely known "tsk". I like to think the point where you really got a friend is when you know them so well, but even then, there might be things you don't know about them.

"It's just sad…" she mumbles.

"It would be weird if it wasn't," I reply.

"Elina…" Aeri winces and pulls me back, "I already told you…I don't think I have the composure to go into that room again…I haven't exactly…been myself lately."

"Yeah, Al told me about it," I reply.

According to Al, Aeri hasn't been in the best of places lately. Al told me she has been having horrible nightmares almost every night. Aeri confessed to this not long ago to him. She feels anxious almost all the time and that's why she's been acting overly weird lately.

"What?!" she freaks, "What did he tell you?!"

That's what he told me, but something makes me think there's more to it. Like this right here, the way she reacted. The pieces are not falling into place as I would like them to; something feels off, something isn't quite right. I have a feeling I'm not getting the full story and I longer know who is providing the truthful details.

"Yeah, Al told me about your nightmares and anxiety," I whisper.

Her eyes are a bit dodgy as I say this but she quickly nods and scratches the side of her head.

"I told him not to tell anyone…" she mutters.

"Hey, it's ok, maybe I can help somehow," I say with a smile.

"I'm trying not to bother anyone else," she says, "thank you though…I really appreciate it."

It's not that I don't believe her, it's just that I've been feeling in my gut that I'm not being told the truth. It pains me that I feel this about my closest friend and my boyfriend. It's not a pleasant sensation. What am I to do though? I want to trust them, to an extent I am, but I wouldn't like to find out that they have been lying to me all this time.

"No worries," I smile, "That's what friends are for."

"Hey, what's taking you guys so long?" Sinna yells a few feet away from us.

"We are coming sweetie!" Aeri exclaims.

I'm turning away to walk over to Sinna when Aeri pulls on my shoulders. I make a few awkward steps backwards and feel her lean a little over me.

"Please don't tell anyone else please," she says dryly.

"I…I won't," I huff.

"Thank you."

With that she walks ahead of me and jogs lightly over to where Sinna is standing. My shoulders shake somewhat involuntarily as a goose bump courses my body. I try to ignore the sensation all together and focus on what we are going to do in this floor.

First things first, there's a flower shop in Tolbana that sells beautiful flowers. If I'm not wrong they probably sell about every flower you can find in the upper floors, it's well stocked to say the least. I want to at least get some flowers for everyone. Some for Daath, some for Kato, for Regi and Owl, and of course…for Twyla. We got a few more things planned on top of the flowers, but most of them are items we got elsewhere. Looking ahead Sinna stops by the flower stand and starts waving her hands at me, I should move it along.

"Eli! Eli!" she yells, "The flowers are over here!"

"Coming!" I yell back as I hurry over to them.

A soon as Aeri walks nearby the flowers she starts having a sneezing fit. Pinching her nose and randomly swatting the air in front of her she walks away and rests her back on a nearby wall. Never though something like that would translate into the virtual world, she most have some minor allergies. Finally making it to the stand I start browsing the flowers. The little street shop boasts an enormous quantity of flowers. Everything from flowers that look just like the ones in the real world to some fantastical looking flora. Almost fluorescent colors can be found in a few of the flowers and the shapes are also noteworthy. I have to say one of my favorite ones is one that quite literally looks like a star; it sports a very shiny yellow color. One flower in particular calls to my attention, the flower looks like a rose but its color is a very bright blue, almost turquoise color. It almost looks like it glows, it's really pretty.

"What about those?" I ask Sinna as I use my right hand to point at the flower.

"Wooow!" she says, "They are pretty!"

Sinna stares with big shiny eyes at the flower but her attention is quickly drawn to something else. Something simpler and in many ways more appropriate than a fictional flower with an odd color. White lilies, beautifully arranged in a small base in the corner of the stand. She stares right at them for a few seconds and then looks at me. She purses her lips and then looks right back at the flowers. I can't help but to chuckle.

"You want to get those?" I ask.

With a quick turn she is looking right at me again. She nods particularly fast and almost instantly I walk over to the vendor. I gesture the NPC and she quickly fetches the base, I transfer the col she asks for and then with a big smile she hands the base over to me. Once I hold the base in my hands I start counting the flowers it contains. Fifteen lilies. For some reason I feel warm inside once I realize we will be able to leave the same number of flowers for each one of our friends. Three for each one. It would've been sad if we had to unevenly leave them flowers.

"Can I hold them?" Sinna asks.

"Sure thing," I say as I place the base in her arms, "Just be careful alright? We still have to walk all the way over to Starting City."

"Are you guys done?" Aeri asks as she pinches her nose.

"You sound funny, hehe," Sinna chuckles.

"Come on, let's get going," Aeri replies.

I place my hand behind Sinna's back and push her a little so we can make our way to Starting City. It's somewhat of a long walk but thankfully the first floor of Aincrad is rather pretty. The green grassy fields extend in the distance and you can see the wind moving through it as is pushes the blades of grass in the distance. Monsters are but a random nuisance in this floor now. As we walk the dirt road I once found myself so afraid to walk through I feel myself smile a little. It's been so long since then, since I was so powerless. In a way I'm proud of myself, I've come a long way, we all have, but this, this moment right now feels like a personal milestone. I can almost see myself a year ago, scared to death, walking this very road at night, with nothing but a small lantern to light our way. I know it's been a while, a very long while, but it all feels so fresh. It's nice in a way, I think I could say it really takes me back. Back to when I met two of the most caring people I have ever met in my life.

"What are thinking about?" Aeri asks.

"Huh? Ah, haha, nothing really, just reminiscing," I say.

"Heh, thinking about back then?" she asks.

She hits the nail right in the head but I'm actually thinking farther back, at a time where she wasn't even around with us. Back when it was only Al, Daath, and I. I really felt like I was in some kind of super team. Daath was incredibly strong and fast, he wasn't afraid of anything. Al was a grumpy person, not that he isn't anymore, but he was way more withdrawn and easy to set off before. We would argue constantly back then, we couldn't go a day without disagreeing on something. To think the very same person is now the person I care the most about in my life.

"Yeah, I remember walking this road to Tolbana on the first day, after the announcement," I say.

"You walked over to Tolbana after the announcement?" Aeri asks, sounding a bit surprised, "On your own?"

I shake my head and stare off in the distance for a second, catching a glimpse of the floating islands over the hills.

"I guess we never told you about the very beginning, huh?" I ponder, "On the very first day Daath convinced us to walk all the way to Tolbana at night."

"You went out at night?!" Sinna asks, "On the first day?"

"Yeah," I laugh, "With Al and Daath."

Sinna twirls on her feet and starts walking backwards. She smiles and gently swings the base from side to side.

"Daath…" Sinna mutters, "Oh! That's your friend right, Aeri?!"

My eyes dart immediately over to Aeri who I expect to have a sour expression but instead she smiles a bit and tilts her head.

"Yeah, he was my friend," Aeri replies.

It's none of my business but I can only assume she is yet to tell Sinna about what Daath really meant for her. I shouldn't pry nor think about it. Sighing out slowly I adjust my eyes to the road and see that we are a few minutes away from Starting City.

"Don't sigh out like that!" Sinna says as she points at me with her right hand.

"Why?" I ask.

"You are going to let all your happiness out!" she says.

"Aww, Sinna," Aeri huffs, "That's adorable."

"It's not adorable!" Sinna says, "It's the truth! Sis told me it was!"

Aeri starts laughing a bit and I can't help but to join her. Sinna's sister sounds like such a wonderful person from everything Sinna's told me about her. A sweet, caring and responsible big sister. Aeri coughs a bit and then eases down from her laughter.

"Say, Sinna," Aeri says, "Are you going to talk with your big sis today?"

"Yes!" Sinna sings and turns around on her feet.

She lifts the base over her head and somehow manages to balance it perfectly over her hair. I almost jump in the reach out for the base but the thing is perfectly balancing on her head as she keeps walking. Aeri pats my back and then chuckles.

"I also want to talk to Regi! Twyla too!" she says.

I can feel my eyes wanting to water up a bit but I hold it in. Still I brush my wrist against my eyes. Sinna has told me several times she knows they are dead and that they possibly can't hear her say anything to them but that she feels this need talk to them nevertheless. They most be kind of lonely wherever they are, I can at least try to make them feel less alone, she said. When I heard it the first time I almost cried. Most people look down on small children but in an odd way I think they have a better understanding of the world than most of us.

"The things she says sometimes," Aeri stifles, "Ah crap…they really get to me."

"Woo! We are here!" Sinna exclaims as we make our final approach on Starting City's massive gate.

Aeri places her hands on her hips and stares at the gate looking utterly upset. She doesn't like the place at all.

"You sure you want to tag along?" I ask.

"I already walked all the way here…" she groans, "Also…I…I think I may also want to talk to someone."

"I see," I say smiling, "I'm sure he wants to talk to you too."

"Oh sh-shut up," she pouts.

Like some kind of medieval maiden going home from the market Sinna still carries the base of lilies with only her head. Spreading her arms apart and moving her body from side to side of the street. More memories flood my mind, this time they don't feel so nice. I look up at the sky and can't help but to go back to when it was turned red. Back when Kayaba finally told us we were trapped in this game for real. His gigantic floating figure blocking the sky, not a good memory, not a good one at all.

"Speaking of remin…uh," Aeri pauses.

"Reminiscing?" I tease.

"Yeah, whatever," she says and sticks her tongue out at me, "We never really talked about anything that happened before we met, actually I remember Daath didn't enjoy talking about the past even if it was recent."

She looks around as we reach the small lake like formation in the middle of the city.

"I stayed in this city for a few days after the announcement," she confesses, "I was kind of scared at the beginning."

"You were scared?" I say sounding exaggeratedly surprised.

"Yeah!" she fallows along with my joke, "Believe it or not, I wasn't always the powerful and fearless woman you know today!"

I press both of my hands against my cheeks and open my mouth in awe.

"No way!" I shout, "I always thought you were this total badass! All my life has been nothing but lies!"

I fall on my knees and look at the ground as I pretend to sob.

"In all seriousness," she mutters and pulls me back up on my feet, "I took a few days to take it all in, but then I thought that if I was going to die, I would at least die fighting this world. You know? At the very least I would try to make it through this thing."

"Woah, that's actually cool sounding," I say.

"What? I can't say cool things?" she retorts.

"Well it's not really your thing," I joke.

She punches my arm and trying my best to hide the fact that it hurt a little I start laughing a bit loudly. Rubbing my arm and pretending to be tougher than I really am I suddenly realize we've made it all the way to building where the Monument of Life is.

"I'm going in," Sinna says.

"Go ahead, we'll catch up in a second," I say.

As I expected Aeri stands frozen in place, her whole body totally unwilling to take another step. She holds herself still and starts breathing somewhat rapidly. I reach out to her and press my hand on top of her shoulder.

"You sure about this?" I ask.

"Yeah…yeah, just give me a second," she huffs, "When…when Regi brought me here, a little while after we first met Sinna…"

"Yeah?" I say softly.

"It really hit me Eli….it really did, I don't know if I can do it again," she says.

She isn't panicking or anything, she just looks uncomfortable and unwilling. A part of me feels bad that I almost forced her hand into this. Her knees wobble slightly but she manages a step forward. She lets her arms hang from her sides and then nods at me.

"Ok…ok," she mumbles, "Let's go."

I walk alongside her, unsure of what to say. It's kind of weird, sometimes all you need is a pat on the back or a little push, but I feel like I should say something. Help her feel better about this whole deal. I just don't know how to do it.

"...everything has been going like super good!" I hear Sinna say, "but...but another friend is no longer with us, her name was Twyla, she was very funny and had this like lizard pet, his name was Edelweiss! He was super cool and cute!"

"It's just surreal, don't you think?" I mumble to Aeri.

"No...it's just sad…" she says.

We keep walking for a bit, slowly approaching Sinna who is joyfully talking the slab at the end of the room. To a stranger it might seem odd, but even then, I like to think everyone can talk whenever they want to someone they miss. Even if the person is...dead. I'm no stranger to that, months on end I found myself talking to my father after the accident, hoping in a way that he would hear me. That somehow...maybe he would answer back. It calmed me down, made me feel better in a way.

Sinna sits on the floor and keeps talking to her sister. She tells her about the past few days what she had for breakfast, how she's been trying super hard to level up and help the guild. I pull down my menu and look for a lantern, a particular one. The one Daath bought for me back at the beginning. I materialize it in my hand and then present it to Aeri.

"Huh? It's not that dark in here," she says.

"It's not that," I say softly, "This is what I brought for him."

"For…him?"

"Daath," I answer.

With shaking hands she takes the lantern from me and closely inspects this. She looks confused.

"Why this?" she asks.

"Back in the beginning, he bought it for me, I was always forgetting the lantern we shared in the inn," I say, "He gave me this one for my use alone, funny thing though, I still sometimes forgot to bring this one along."

"That sounds…" she pauses and wipes tears off her eyes, "Like something he would do."

"We also brought flowers!" Sinna exclaims.

I dig some more through my inventory and take out a small stuffed animal I made. Sinna mentioned leaving a stuffed bunny for her sister and I just sort of started sewing and made a smaller, cuter version of Edelweiss. I squeeze the green lizard plushy in my hands and smile.

"Eli!" Sinna calls, "How many flowers are we leaving for them?"

"Three each, Sinna, place what you brought along with flowers under their names," I instruct.

Giddy, Sinna pulls down her menu and out of her inventory takes out a sword and a shield. Sinna says Reginald passed them down to her once he got better gear. Sinna places the sword and shield under one of the name columns. She then goes back to the small base and takes three flowers. The shield has something written over it, something in particular I want Regi to be remembered by. Over his shield the words "The Bravest Knight" are written. I'm sure that even after he left the guild with Aeri, even after everything that happened he tried his very best to reach for those words. I'm sure he did, I'm sure he lived up to those words.

"I didn't get to say goodbye...like with sis," Sinna starts, "It makes me sad, but I know I have to keep going, for you, for sis. I will do my best, I promise. I will be brave, I will be strong, I will laugh and be happy just like you were all the time."

Sinna kneels and places the flowers on top of the weapons she laid out in the floor.

"Please take care of my sister," Sinna says, "If you are with her, tell her I think about her every day."

I walk over to the base that sits on the floor and grab three flowers as well. I walk over to the slab and look for Twyla's name on it. She is the last name in the section with names that start with a "T". I bend a knee and set my Edelweiss plushy on the floor. I rest the flowers on its back and then stand up straight.

"I'm glad I got to meet you, Twyla, you were probably the most easygoing person I've met here," I mutter, "Your energy and happiness was contagious, you made bad days good…I just wish you could've stayed with us longer."

Repeating the process I go back for another three flowers but this time take a broadsword out of my inventory. I quickly find Kato's name and rest the sword against the monument itself. I balance the flowers on the cross guard and stand back.

I didn't know much about Kato, he was actually rather scary to approach, but he was like all of, just another person trying to survive. He was nice, and caring, that much I can say, sadly I just never talked much to him and whenever I did he seemed a little distant. He was a part of us though and so we leave something for him as well.

"I didn't get to meet Owl," Sinna says, "What was he like?"

"He was the nicest guy," I say, "He was tall and calm."

Once out of my mouth they sound like really vague words to describe him but in reality that was Owl in a nutshell. A gentle person who cared for everyone and did his best to keep everyone on the same page.

"He always kept a cool head and helped us out whenever he could," Aeri adds, "He was one hell of a guy…"

"Esra baked him this cake," I huff and take a small cake out of my inventory, "She said she owed him."

"Can we hurry this along?" Aeri says softly.

Her voice is a bit tear jerked and she is growing impatient. I nod at her and set the cake under Owl's name. I hurry back for flowers and set them next to Esra's gift. On my way back I grab the last three flowers and give them to Aeri.

She grips them somewhat tightly and in a hurried manner makes her way to Daath's column. Sinna walks over to her and hugs her from behind. Aeri starts crying a bit louder and lights up the lantern. She stares at the light for a few seconds and gently sets the lantern on the ground. She leaves the lantern and flowers behind and makes her way back to me with Sinna in her arms.

"Can we go now?" she begs.

"Of course let's go back home." I say.

Aeri holds Sinna close as we exit the Monument of Life. I'm glad we made the little trip, this way they can have something more than just a name on a giant rock. It's more personal and I think they would like it.

Our steps slowly stop to echo once we step out back into the streets of Starting City. I take in a deep breath and look around just to notice a black hooded figure a few feet away from us. I tilt my head as I feel a bit confused. The person in front of us seems to be staring right in our direction. Aeri sets Sinna on the ground and pushes her over to me.

"Elina, I need you to run for the gate, now," Aeri says, "Don't go to guild house, go somewhere else and hide."

"What? Why?" I ask.

Aeri's hands shine brightly as she equips her red gauntlets. What is she doing? This is supposed to be a safe area. Why is she equipping her weapons?

"Go hide somewhere and take care of Sinna!" she yells.

"Aeri, what's going on?" I ask before taking Sinna's hand.

Aeri clenches her hands into fists and starts breathing rather erratically.

"I need you to do as I say right now!" she orders.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Haha! I bet you were thinking we were finally gonna have a relaxed chapter where nothing bad happened! I know, I know, this is criminally short but I had to do it like this to set up the tension! Really though in this arc so far we haven't had a single chapter where I can truly say my characters have had a nice day. I'm a horrible person to them huh? Either way, I like the title of this chapter a lot. To be honest it just stuck because of the following. For me it means the little things that they do for the people they've lost, but at the same time I interpreted as the little things that seem off the Elina. The little things that are wrong, you know? That's just me rambling about my dumb creative process.

**Electronic Ink 0: **It's not like I want to ; - ; allegedly one of the ways to keep your story interesting and engaging is to make your characters walk through egg shells but lately it seems like I'm forcing them to walk on jaggy crystals haha. **SkySlash9: **Thank you so much! I really think the previous chapter is one of my greatest to date. Also as for a sequel I don't really want to say no to the idea, but at the same time my whole lay out for Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds does not have a sequel in mind. By the end of my story if you stick around with me you will see why this is.

That's it for this week! If you like what you read please leave a review, I know a lot of people make it this far (that or the particular user view count is lying) so why not leave a review if you haven't? Would really love to see what more of you think about my story! See you all next week!

Next Chapter: "In Harm's Way"


	59. Chapter 59 - In Harm's Way

**Chapter 59: In Harm's Way**

**February/22nd/2024**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Starting City**

**Aeri**

Elina runs away as soon as I yell at her, pulling Sinna along with her she hastily runs towards the main plaza in Starting City. I can only hope she doesn't go straight to the guild house. She absolutely needs to go elsewhere. I wouldn't be surprised if the Laughing Coffin already knows the location of our guild house. After all, Klaus is with them and he specifically sent people to get us out of there once.

I fucked up, this wasn't supposed to happen, Laughing Coffin wasn't supposed to find out about this. I should've been more careful. Why wasn't I more careful?

"You were too eager to kill," Mirai says.

I was. That much I can admit. I was too eager to start hunting them down that I didn't give it a second thought. I wanted to get my revenge and I pulled Al along with me, then Esra, and then Ruri.

"A fucking poison," she mumbles.

Nothing more than that, all I've done since the beginning is complicate things. I've always been a bother to everyone. Things for Al and the guild took a turn for the better the moment I left. The moment I come back people died and things start going to shit…again.

Part of me is very surprised this didn't happen any sooner. We should've practiced more caution, but now is no longer the time to worry about it. We are well past that point, yet, I'm panicking, I'm out of breath. It's no surprise that they found me, after all Klaus already had his suspicions and he knows where we are settled. Everyone is in danger, I need to warn everyone.

"Why warn anyone? You just need to kill that person over there though," Mirai says softly, "I doubt the guy over there came with any friends, you just have to kill him, and it would be like they never found you. You haven't killed anyone in a while too…go ahead you'll fix two problems."

She is right. I smile feeling rather wicked. I scan the area with my eyes the black hooded person stands still a few feet away. No one is behind this person and nobody else seems to be in sight. He is alone, what a stupid thing to do. If I get a hold of him it would only be a matter of dragging him or her out of town. Once outside I just have to kill this stupid person. Then I just have to find the next and keep taking them out, yeah, I can do that. I can manage that. I rotate my wrists and open my palms as I start to feel how my body loosens up. I bend my knees a little and get ready to jump.

"Smart, choice," the hooded figure says, "We don't want to make a scene now, do we?"

My legs relax as he speaks. I've heard this voice before. It's husky and intoxicating, the tone is completely calm and deceiving. One could easily mistake this voice with one of a sane person. I know the tone all too good though.

"Haha, wait, we know this guy, now don't we?" Mirai chuckles.

"PoH…" I mutter.

He removes his hood and grins widely in my direction. This is the first time I get to take a good long look at his face. He has a sharp chin and surprisingly full lips. Narrow brown eyes that give the stare of a tired and fed up man. On his right cheek a long and sickly purple looking scar. He tilts his head up a bit, striking an imposing stance with a relaxed body. It really feels like a waste, for such a good looking man to be in my long list of people I want to kill.

"You've been busy, young lady," he huffs, "killing my people…I tried my best not to believe a word out of Klaus' mouth but it seems he was more than right."

"Oh my, is the leader of the Giggling Caskets here to finish the job?" Mirai jokes, "Makes you wonder why he let you go in the first place, huh?"

I smile back, the fact that this particular member of the Laughing Coffin turned out to be a familiar one puts me at ease for reasons I cannot explain. A part of the uncertainty in my being has lifted, maybe I can turn things into my favor, and maybe I can kill him, cut off the head of his little organization. Then it's just a matter of watching them disperse and admits that chaos I can get Klaus I can finally end it.

"Wow, you are getting greedy," Mirai says, "Why don't we take this on a day by day basis?"

"I thought that was exactly what you expected of me, besides I wouldn't exactly consider your poorly trained followers as busywork," I grin, "Too easy to kill to be considered so."

"Cheeky," he laughs.

I smirk at him and slowly make an approach on him. I take my sweet time to get close to PoH; he stands still not paying a single bit of attention to me. What game is he playing? Is he trying to intimidate me?

"This way is all too serene, he is yet to spout any nonsense," Mirai comments.

Unsure of the last few steps I take I bridge the distance between PoH and myself to just a foot or so. His eyes slowly place themselves on me and he breathes out through noise with a really annoyed expression.

"It truly is in your best interest to stop bothering me," he says.

"Huh?" I exclaim bitterly, "I'm just having some fun, after all I still need to get Klaus, and your other followers. Oh! Oh! Then I have to kill you."

I cough awkwardly after saying my sentence as I feel it wasn't really my own. I try not to appear too uncomfortable with myself and cross my arms.

"You won't succeed, young lady," he says.

"Why are you so sure?" I ask.

"Because I won't let you," he says with a smile, "Or should I say…your friends won't let you."

"Here comes the nonsense," Mirai chuckles.

I can see PoH move his hands under his cloak, he fumbles around for a few seconds making his cloak sway from side to side until what look like photographs start dropping from under it. One after the other they fall from his cloak into the floor and once I see the people in the pictures my blood runs cold.

"He's been busy," Mirai says.

Every single picture is from people in the guild. Al, Elina, Kayla, Ruri, Esra, Hotoka, Siren, Aereth, Billfray, and even Sinna. Every picture taken at a different time, in a different place.

"As you can see," PoH starts, "It would be dumb to continue your pursuit."

I fight the urge to kneel and pick up the photographs but I must not show any kind of weakness against this guy. Once I do he'll know he's got me in the bag. I must not let him know.

"What of it?" I say, "We can just go back into hiding."

PoH chuckles and starts to yet again look for something inside his cloak. He comes to a stop faster than before and breathes in deeply. With his left hand he shows me additional pictures of Al, Esra and Ruri.

"Your partners in crime," he says, "I have them identified."

Suddenly my own spit becomes hard to swallow. It's worse than I could've imagined. Esra was right. It was very dumb to assume that the Laughing Coffin wasn't keeping tabs on us. They have and more thoroughly that I could've expected, this is bad, very bad.

"I'll just warn them, it's very stupid of you to be telling me this," I say, "We'll just disappear, like we did before."

PoH's eyes widen a bit and he grins, showing his teeth in a macabre way. He laughs for a few seconds before speaking once again.

"I really don't think you fully understand the gravity of your situation," he smiles and brings up two other photographs.

One shows Hotoka, bound by her hands and legs, a boot stepping on her face. I try to get the most details out of the picture but my heart starts beating faster as I keep my eyes on the picture. It's a dark place, I can only clearly make out her face and the fact that she is scared and in pain. The other picture shows Siren tied up in a similar fashion, the difference being the angle and closeness of the shot. I can see the tears on the edge of her eyes as she stares down a blade that is ever so lightly pressed against her neck.

"Oh boy," Mirai huffs.

"We can find you whenever we want," he says, "And do whatever we want with you and your precious little friends."

I drop my menu down and switch over to the guild tab. Scanning for their names like crazy I find Hotoka's first and click on it. She is on Floor seven. I back out of the previous screen and click on Siren's name, the menu quickly displays that she is currently on floor twenty seven.

"I take your lack of words to mean that you know understand that you are not in control here," PoH says, "Now, allow me to suggest something…a deal you can take."

I'm unable to formulate a single sentence, I stand still with my arms crossed, staring into his grim brown eyes. He is extremely calm as he presents the pictures to me as if he expected me to react like this.

"I will order for both of them to be released if you can beat me in a duel," he says, "Only if you do, and only then will you be able to live another day without a dear friend of yours dying."

"And if I don't?" I ask slowly.

"If you fail to beat me, you'll have to make a choice," he explains, "I will allow you to save one of your friends, only one, and the other I will order to be killed."

He smiles from ear to ear as he finishes saying this. He lowers his arm back inside his cloak and pockets the pictures. He takes a step forward and raising his right hand a little he materializes his cleaver like weapon into his hand.

"Are we clear?" he asks, "Or would you like for me to repeat myself?"

"Keep it together," Mirai scoffs, "You can beat him."

It's weird that at times she decides to be supportive, to actually push me instead of dragging me down and making my life miserable, I merely think it's at times when it benefits her. I still don't know her endgame, why is she sticking around? It must be something on my end, after all I'm the one that sees her. I just wish I knew exactly what she wants maybe that way she would leave.

I nod at PoH and he takes a few steps back. He goes into his menu and sends me a duel invite. He sets the rules for a half loss mode duel. That means I can kill him if my last attack is strong enough, but what good would that do? If he is not alive by the end of this there is no one to tell his minions to free the girls. He probably thought about this thoroughly, there's really no way for me to get away with everything. Even if I win, he'll probably run away, he might not even honor his deal and have both of them killed.

"So who are you going to save?" Mirai teases, "If you lose, that is."

I press the according button to accept PoH's duel and our names appear floating the air above us with a timer in the middle. I feel as if time has slowed down. My brain is overthinking everything, trying to find a way out of this. Analyzing all the possible outcomes of this battle, even the ones where I lose. Who do I even save? It's a dirty move that he chose them, the two people I know the least from the guild. Coincidentally just happen to be the people that have spent time with Al and the others ever since I disappeared. It feels so dirty, it feels like he knows, he clearly knows.

"I mean that Hotoka girl is pretty fun, kind of dumb but I don't exactly dislike her," Mirai says.

I never even sat down to talk to her, I could honestly admit the most I know about her is that she likes eating food in absurd quantities and that she likes to be lazy and stay around the guild house, mostly in her pajamas. Siren I know the least, I barely know her, but in a way she reminds me of myself. She keeps to herself and likes being quiet. I think the right thing to think is that she actually reminds me of how I was in the past, lately I'm everything but quiet, I guess though…in a way I still keep to myself.

"As for that other girl…" Mirai mutters, "She is a damn weirdo, always staying away from everyone, getting all nervous and stupid when around a boy…she is like a bad caricature."

"Young lady," PoH calls out to me, "You seem to be side-tracked."

I shake my head and realize the prep time timer has reached its last few seconds. I raise my guard and take a few steps back.

"Ok, let's do this," I say softly.

"You are losing your drive," Mirai says, "Come on, get angry!"

"Yes, let us begin," PoH says as bends his knees, "It's showtime."

The timer reaches zero and he jumps in the air, lifting his cleaver above his head. I make a quick short jump the right and see him crash down just inches away from me. He turns his head to me and slashes at me with the cleaver. Once again I'm able to make a small jump in order to avoid the blade of his weapon. He's fast, faster than I expected, it might be hard to take a hold of his blade. He keeps slashing at me, relentlessly and with amazing speed. I just have to keep moving though, stay fast on my own feet. A step backwards, a step to the side, a little jump to the left, that is all that is keeping me from getting struck right now.

"Is he even trying to hit you?" Mirai ponders.

The thought crosses my mind, but he is trying so hard to get me that I doubt this is all calculated effort to not actually hit me. The sheer strength with which he swings his weapon is amazing and to only be doing so with one arm is even more incredible. I can audibly hear the blade cut through the air, as it makes that swooshing sound. I try to examine his moves thoroughly; he seems to be repeating some sort of combo.

He slashes from the right, then from the left, after that he makes a quick diagonal slash before finally trying an overhead strike. Four moves which he seems to complete in less than three seconds. I keep stepping away, avoiding his blade until I see him repeat the same thing four times. I raise my left hand a bit and step in as he tries the overhead strike again. I catch his blade and stop it just a few inches away from my head. I'm pulling my right hand back to strike when he stabs a dagger through my shoulder with his free hand. His eyes look wicked as he drives the smaller weapon through my shoulder. He was expecting me to do that, he was waiting.

I lift my right leg from the ground but just before I'm able to kick him he retreats with a jump, taking both of his weapons with him.

"You, were just waiting for me to do that…" I spit, "You were, right?"

"I was merely trying to see what those gauntlets of yours could do to my blade," he says as he glides the dagger over the cleaver, making an annoying metallic grinding sound in the process, "You see, the properties of this weapon are rather special. It cuts through any kind of armor or weapon in the game. Most of the time with just a single strike."

He pauses and readjusts the grip on both of his weapons.

"Or so I thought," he finishes and pockets the dagger.

"What the hell is your goal?!" I ask.

"No, shut up, you don't get to break right now!" Mirai scolds me.

I don't care about what she says at this point. I just want some answers; I've been in the dark for too long. With Klaus at least I had the certainty that all he did was to get back at us, but this guy, PoH, what's his goal? What does he want?

"My goal is to gather people under one understanding," he says, "To make them understand that everything happening in this world is the fault of one man and one man alone! That man being the creator of this game, Kayaba Akihiko! We should not be tied by ethics or morality in this world! Everything we do ultimately falls down in the hands of that man, not ours!"

"That's…that's just nonsense!" I scream.

He dashes towards me and tries to strike me with and upwards slash. I manage to put my hand down and stop the blade just before it hits me. This allows PoH to get his mug close to mine, he tries to inch his weapon closer and closer to me with all his strength but I also put all my strength in not allowing the blade to get any closer.

"Tell me young lady," he says, "Who exactly is to blame for all the people you have struck down?"

I feel my left hand shake a little as he starts to overpower me. Instead of attacking with my free hand I'm forced to lower my right hand as well and help myself steady the weapon in its place.

"Me…" I grunt, "I struck them down…"

"Wrong, the person to blame here is Kayaba himself!" PoH says, "You did not place that damned helmet over their heads, you did not create the Nervegear with the purpose to kill!"

"What the hell is he even trying to pull here?" Mirai says, sounding annoyed.

He drops his free hand to the cleaver's handle and with a little extra force he forces his way through my defense. I feel the very edge of the cleaver dig itself into my skin starting in my right leg all the way up to my shoulder. The attack is strong enough to drop my health by a quarter; the weapon must be enhanced more than a couple of times.

"You have to be honest with yourself," PoH says, "You know it's true, that's why it doesn't feel wrong when you kill. That's why you haven't stopped."

"No…I…" I stammer, "That's not it…"

"He isn't entirely wrong now is he?" Mirai titters.

I'm in a daze as he approaches me, I react poorly and trip backwards when I notice his fast approach, his weapon shining red. I fall flat on my back and can only raise my hands to try and grab his weapon. I get a hold of the blade but my hand slips allowing the cleaver to slam down against my body. My health drops immediately to a little past half

"I really thought you were going to be a more worthy opponent," he says, "Eres un desperdicio de mi tiempo."

The last bit he says in a language I can't understand. I'm still lying on the floor, both surprised and in shock as the realization that I lost begins to sink in me. I rise form the ground and grab my head with my hands. This can't be happening…

PoH stashes his weapon back in his inventory and holds up the two pictures of my captured guild members. He walks over to me and practically pushes the pictures into my face.

"Now, you get to choose," he says.

In a fit of anger I swing my right fist at him, the system promptly stops me a few inches away from his face. The hexagonal grid briefly displays itself and I feel my knuckles reach a hard surface.

"Now, if you only had shown such determination while we fought," he says, sounding disappointed, "Now choose."

I stare at both of the pictures. I don't know which one to choose, this isn't fair, this isn't fair at all. I raise my hand over the pictures and hover over both of them as I'm unable to make a choice.

"Or would you prefer that both of them died today?" He asks.

"Better make choice, fast," Mirai insists.

I grab Hotoka's picture desperately and pull it close to me. PoH grabs the Siren's picture and tears it in half. He pulls down his menu and I can see him send a few drafted messages. My hands tremble as I hold Hotoka's picture but my eyes are still keenly trained on PoH.

"Kinda funny that the weirdo will die all alone, I guess in the end she did enjoy solitude," Mirai mocks.

"Now, you will find her in a place I'm told you know rather well, Monster Hunter Cinder," he says.

The Monster Arena, Hotoka is somewhere in there. I need to hurry. I turn around quickly and set myself to the main plaza when PoH places his hand over my shoulder. He pulls on me and allowing my body to twist to his bidding I find myself facing him again.

"I really do suggest you stop this stupid little hunt of yours," he pauses, "It would be a shame if something were to happen to that little girl you love so much."

I draw air in so quickly that I almost choke. I feel my whole body shake and tremble in a pathetic way as I nearly trip once again as try to walk away from the leader of Laughing Coffin. I run as fast as I can to Starting City's gate. Using its menu I select floor seven and seconds later appear in a somewhat crowded plaza. To my left there is a wide street that makes it way all the way up to the arena. I get tunnel vision as I stare at the coliseum like building. I'm pushing my way through the streets, pushing NPCs, pushing players away. The only things I'm able to hear are my steps loudly echoing in my head, my heartbeat thumping in my ears and myself struggling to breathe in and out. Once I reach the entrance of the arena I make my way around it, the place where fighters get ready is on the exact opposite side of the regular entrance.

"Come on…come on…" I say to myself.

"Why are you even hurrying? Siren is probably dead by now, even if you reach Hotoka quickly you don't even know where to start looking for the other girl," Mirai says.

"I have to try!" I say.

"Idiot…" she mumbles.

Placing my left hand on the wall I grab unto the very end of it to help me turn into the tunnel that goes down into the prep area. It's dark except for a few torches that light the way. At the end of the tunnel you can see the gate that leads straight into the arena. All along the darkened tunnel I'm unable to see Hotoka. She must be in one of the rooms. Midway through the tunnel are some doors that serve as individual lockers rooms, inside those places you can get ready in private or just wait out your time to fight, but it only makes sense for her to be inside of one of those.

I try the first door on the right and I find her, sadly she is in worst shape than in the picture I was given. Unlike the picture she is now tied up only by her hands as she dangles from the ceiling, her feet not even touching the ground. She wears only her underwear and her head is pointed at the floor below her. She looks like some kind of broken doll. What did they do to her? Her body is covered in red glowing scars, along her stomach, arms, legs I could bet there are some on her face but I can't see it.

I enter the room and close the door behind me. The sound it makes as it closes makes her jerk her head a little. She lifts her head and I can now see a couple of glowing scars covering her face.

"So…so you came for me?" she says softly, sounding pained, "I could've sworn you didn't even like me…"

"I'm getting you down, hang on," I reply.

Quickly I get to her side and stand on my tiptoes to reach whatever is binding her hands to the ceiling. It feels like some sort of rope but as I use my finger tips to cut it I realize it's far too thick for me to be done quickly.

"Did…did you know…" she groans, "That to accept a duel invite they just have to force your hand to accept it? I…I didn't know that, they had fun stabbing me for a while with that…"

I remain silent as I keep trying to cut her loose, but my progress is all too slow. I look around and find a small box sitting against the wall. I quickly fetch it and stand over it to work faster on setting her loose.

"The punches also hurt a lot…" she cries, "Those didn't leave any marks though…haha. They did a lot of other stuff too…I don't feel like telling though."

I keep cutting and cutting until she drops from the ceiling, she falls on her knees and bends over as she wraps her arms around herself.

"I…I was just in the market…" she says, "Looking for some apples for a stupid quest…"

"Hotoka," I mumble and kneel next to her, "We have to go, it isn't safe here."

She starts laughing a little.

"Safe?" she starts, "You are the reason why we aren't safe…"

As she says this she straightens up a bit and stares at me looking very angry, she is enraged.

"If you are here, that means they are going to kill Siren," she croaks.

"You know about that…?" I question.

She nods and with her hand opens her menu up.

"Yeah, they told me about everything, what you've been doing…killing these guys with other people from our own guild…" she mutters.

She goes into her friends tab and locating Siren's name we both notice that it is now grayed out. She dismisses her menu and lets her arms hang at her sides.

"This is all your fault," she says bitterly, "No wait…it's also Al's, Ruri's and Esra's fault."

She swings her body towards me and wraps her hands around my neck. She squeezes tightly as she pushes me down, enough to put my back against the floor.

"It's your fault!" she yells, "You had to go and do what we all agreed not to do! What we all agreed not to do because we all said it would be dangerous! Because we didn't want anyone else to die! You stupid, selfish bitch!"

She is trying very hard to choke me, I can feel as I run out of air and it becomes increasingly difficult to let more in. Her nails digging into my skin, yet I lack the strength or will to stop her. It is in fact my fault, she deserves to do this…at the very least she deserves to do this to me. My vision starts getting a bit blurry but it's not because of the lack of air. It's because she crying, she is crying over me. Her tears fall all over my face, including my own eyes.

"You…you killed her…" she sobs, "By saving me you basically told them to kill her!"

Her grip around my neck falters and then it starts to loosen up little by little. Bells start ringing in my ears as I start getting messages, multiple of them. She pulls her hands away from me but remains sitting on top of me as she keeps crying.

In weird sort of haze I open my menu, completely ignoring everything that she just said. I have several messages from Al.

-From: Alshep  
-To: Aeri  
-Subject:  
-Message: Aeri what the hell just happened? Elina came back saying something about you telling her to run away. She mentioned a guy dressed in black, did you find someone from the Laughing Coffin?

-From: Alshep  
-To: Aeri  
-Subject:  
-Message: What is happening Aeri? Reply already, what the fuck is going on?!

-From: Alshep  
-To: Aeri  
-Subject:  
-Message: They got to Siren? Why is she dead? What happened to her?! Was it them?! Aeri get back here immediately!"

"I'm going to tell everyone in the guild…" Hotoka says as she stands up, "Then I'm leaving…I don't want to see you ever again in my entire life."

"Hotoka wait…" I squirm, "You can't!"

"I can and I will, I won't allow anyone else to die because of you, I've had enough."

Sluggishly she makes her way out of the room and I follow her into the tunnel. She walks slowly and wobbling from side to side. What the hell do I even do?

"Are you gonna let her, tell on you?" Mirai butts in.

"Shut up…" I mutter.

"Fine, fine," she answers, "It's going to be fun to go back home."

I need help, I need to stop the Laughing Coffin at once. I need to do something about this. Working in the shadows and killing them one by one is not going to cut it anymore. I need more people, I need someone to help me eliminate them. I open my menu up and start typing a message directed to Asuna.

* * *

**Fifty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Granzam – New Knights of the Blood HQ**

"Aeri I know a bit about this group of players, but are you sure you want to come down on the guild leaders with an idea like this?" Asuna asks, "You look pretty shaken up, you sure you are ok?"

I nod slowly as I try to ignore the bells ringing in my ears. All the time it took me to get here I've been getting multiple messages from everyone in the guild. I saw a few, but I now refuse to even open them. The new HQ for Asuna's guild is even bigger than before it takes us a minute or so to walk down a long hallway to where a meeting room is located.

"Geez…well either way I already told everyone but that idiot Lind about what you want to do. It all now depends on whether they want to help or not." she huffs, "I might get some flak for this but you said it was really important to tell your idea to anyone who mattered so I pulled a lot of strings…I just hope Heathcliff doesn't hold it to me so badly."

She opens a set of double doors and inside I can see four other individuals. I've seen all of them before, back in the meeting for when we were being considered to participate with the floor clearers. They are the leaders of the important guilds in Aincrad.

"Glad to see you are able to join us, Aeri," says Heathcliff, "I hear from Asuna you have a rather specific request and that it concerns this group of troublemakers called Laughing Coffin."

"Huh, what are those bastards up to now?" Lind asks.

"I apologize, I now realize you were probably the only one to not get briefed on the matter," Heathcliff says.

"I hope you realize what you are proposing is tantamount to a crusade, capturing them would be a top priority of course, but we cannot be playing savior with these people, lethal force would also need to be applied into the equation." Thinker says.

I nod at him, I know what all of this means, but it needs to be done and the sooner we do the best it will be for everyone.

"Gah! What the hell are you all talking about?!" Lind stresses.

"Let's just allow Aeri to explain," Klein intervenes.

"By all means, Aeri please speak when you are ready," Heathcliff says.

I take a deep breath and try to calm myself down as I keep hearing the bells of arriving messages in my ears.

"I would like to propose a coalition to take down the group of people known as Laughing Coffin."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

There are no breaks on the pain train! I wish I was joking there ain't gonna be happy chapters for a while. I need to tell you all something that happened while I was writing this chapter that made me feel sad. So I was making a character count on my own characters, you know to actually remind myself who was alive and who wasn't. (I sometimes forget haha) So I was making the count of the ones who were alive and they just didn't add up. So kept doing it over and over again and the numbers didn't add up. Until I realized I literally killed Twyla a bit ago. It made me feel sad for some reason. I miss you Twyla ;- ;

**ICO: **Yeah it had been a while since I made people cry. I hope this chapter lives up to your expectation of shit hitting the fan. As for your comment on the chapter itself. You couldn't be more spot on and it saddens me in a way. Because you are so right, somewhere along the line I failed to give Elina the attention she needed in order to make the past chapter better than it was. You have a keen eye, I can only hope future moments in the story don't make you feel like that haha. **Electronic Ink 0: **This isn't exactly drama too right? It's more like just pain and suffering, I feel like a massive douche to my characters sometimes. I will work on the proofreading, sadly I haven't been able to get a hold of the beta but trust me I try my hardest haha, thanks for pointing out the mistakes though. I hope **unbakedmuffins** makes it here soon I really liked his reviews haha.

Not much to say for this week, I kind of want to go back and revise all of my chapters for any dumb mistakes that might be in them. I know there's a few in pretty much every chapter but I would really like to go back and fix them at some point. So I will slowly start revising in each chapter along the weeks to come. That way I'll make sure they are mostly mistake free. That is all for today though, sorry on the late upload! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Divided"


	60. Chapter 60 - Divided

**Chapter 60: Divided**

**February/22nd/2024**

**Forty Ninth Floor of Aincrad – Myujen – Silberian Inn**

**Aereth**

It really doesn't make any sense in my head why we were suddenly asked to meet with the people that went out of their way to put us in danger. Al, Ruri and Esra practically ran away as soon as Hotoka came back. There's the lingering thought in the back of my head that maybe they only called upon us because they think we have no apparent reason to be mad. I'm mad though, what they did was a stupid thing and it was even more stupid to keep it a secret, to go behind the backs of everyone in the guild. I can't speak for Billfray but if anything he looks somewhat distressed.

Making our way through the inn's dining area we take a sharp left to a small hallway that leads to some of the rooms in the inn. They are ashamed of their actions that much I can assume; otherwise there would be no reason to call a meeting like this. They don't want the others to hear what is going to be discussed here nor do they really want to face the consequences of their actions.

"I guess this it," Billfray mutters, "They said third door to the left…"

The door in front of me has a chestnut shade to it, kind of odd of me to notice, but my brain seized working properly as I made the trip here. Hotoka was very explicit when telling us what Aeri and everyone else had been up to. Chasing Laughing Coffin and hunting them, after we all agreed on not doing so. That damned kid we have as a guild leader along with Aeri weren't careful at all when executing their plans. They were too sloppy and didn't bother at all in covering their tracks. Those mistakes took the life of Siren and ultimately made Hotoka not want to be involved with us any further. Hotoka left the guild, but she did so only after making it clear whose fault it was that she got taken and that the fact that she was saved decided the fate of Siren. To say that I'm angry is an understatement. I never asked for this. I did not ask to be involved in this kind of situation. Practically being forced to fight floor bosses is one thing, which is a group effort, that effort is ultimately focused on a greater goal. This goal being getting us all out of here alive. I can't be dealing with any more extra trouble even more so if the trouble is out to kill us and us alone.

"Damn, you are looking scary," Billfray mumbles, "You sure you want to do this now?"

"Look, they've done some pretty stupid stuff in the past, hell Aeri is not exactly the brightest person I've ever known, but this whole damned situation already took the lives of three people," I explain myself, "I'm not exactly sure of how I feel about this…but they have put us in the path of people that want to kill us, and I'm not ok with that."

Billfray nods, he is a smart guy, the problem is that he rarely choses to voice his opinion. I don't even bother on knocking the door. I place my right hand on the knob and turn it. I push the door in and walk in voicing my mind.

"Just what in the hell were you thinking?" I fume.

I make it a task to locate the two people that started this. Alshep and Aeri are sitting at a small table in the middle of the room. As expected Esra stands behind Al, her hands over her apron, waiting hand and foot for her next order probably. Ruri sits on the edge of the bed, her head facing down, she stares at her own feet as she sighs out loudly.

There have been times when tension has been high but never has it reached this level. Everyone's got something to pick with each other. Elina is angry at Al for lying to her over the course of a few months. Kayla is disappointed at Ruri for also keeping this whole scenario from her, and I'm more than pissed off at these stupid teenagers for doing something so stupid. Not to mention that Sinna is thoroughly upset at everyone's behavior. The feeling of disappointment and rage that I harbor is slightly more focused on Esra. I trusted her to be the smartest individual in the house, but it would seem loyalty plays a larger role in her thinking than I would've thought.

Everyone but Al refuses to look at me; everyone else just stares away or acts as if I just didn't enter the room to shout at them. Billfray closes the door behind him and leans against it. As I've said, he not really one to voice his opinion.

"So you guys are not even going to try and excuse yourselves?" I ask.

"Would that make you happy?" Aeri answers, "Us trying to make up excuses for our behavior? Would that make you happy?"

Answering with questions is not really answering but she makes a fine point. If they were trying to make up excuses it would just piss me off more, but at the very least I would like to see them explain themselves.

"Just answer this," I start, "Why couldn't you guys just let it go?"

Aeri turns her head to me and her eyebrows burrow. She stands up, knocking the chair she was sitting at back.

"Because they deserve it!" she says, "They killed our own, it only makes sense for us to kill them!"

"No it doesn't!" I reply, "Killing is not the answer here Aeri. I'm baffled that you guys went down this route. How many have you killed? How many lives have you four taken with your hands? Do you even truly realize what you have been doing?"

Al chuckles briefly and covers his eyes with his hands. He continues to chuckle as he rubs his eyes.

"Didn't you tell me I could choose to go down that road?" He says, "You actually sort of suggested it…either way that's not what we are here to discuss."

I swallow my own spit and clench my hands into fists.

"That was before…" I mutter.

"Before what?" Aeri asks suddenly, "Oh that's right, it was before you actually gave a shit about any of us, right? Back when you had nothing to lose, back when you were just being dragged along…"

"Yeah, who are you to dare talk down on us, huh?" Ruri says as she gets up from the bed, "You weren't with us when we got attacked by those people. You don't get to tell us what we should and shouldn't do!"

Suddenly everyone feels like talking and as I expected they do not even own up to their actions, they are trying to dismiss it as something righteous, as something they needed to do. They are using the dead as their excuse, a card I'm all too used to playing but this doesn't justify anything. They have become killers all in the sake of avenging the dead, in the sake of justice. Their intentions might be clean but their means are anything but.

"Are you truly the best person to be talking about morality?" Esra says.

I turn to look at her and get see an expression I have never seen on the maid. Her eyes devoid of any kind of emotion, they look blank and unmoving as she speaks. However she keeps her courteous stance, her hands together, hanging just in front of her apron.

"What are you talking about?" I ask

"You are a soldier of fortune, or at least you were," she says, "It's hard for me to wrap my head around as to what is the real reason you've decided to stay with us. I cannot understand what you get out of staying with us, although, I do have my suspicions. It's because of that little girl, isn't it?"

"And? So what if it is?"

"I made my research on your person, Aereth," she says, "You stole, vandalized, threatened, helped the wrong people to get away with their crimes, and you also killed."

"I only ever killed once…" I say bitterly.

"And you got paid for it," she says quickly, "Where does that rank on your twisted sense of morality?"

"I had no other cho-"

"Oh, just shut up!" Billfray rages.

The situation in the room suddenly comes to a halt as everyone turns their attention to him. He softly pushes himself off the closed door and walks to stand next to me.

"Are you guys even hearing the things you are saying?" he asks, his tone suddenly becoming softer, "You are trying to justify murder, do you know how fucked up that sounds?"

Aeri is about to talk back at Billfray but she stops herself and crosses her arms. Ruri goes back to staring at her feet and the maid diligently pays attention to him.

"I've gotten all kinds of versions about what happened to this guild," Billfray continues, "You guys had a tight group and it was when you let more people in that you got betrayed, you lost people you cared about, but damn…who hasn't?"

For some reason Billfray has managed in just a few sentences to do what I wanted to do since I came into the room. With just a handful of words he has managed to make them think about their actions, to reflect on them.

"I'm sure you all had your reasons, I'm sure the way you are looking at them they seem like valid reasons…" he says, "but, not only have you been murdering people, but your actions have made it so people that aren't involved start getting hurt. Siren is dead…and she had nothing to do with this."

After Billfray is done speaking we fall into a silence. It becomes quiet to the point where I can hear myself breathe. Then a muffled cry becomes apparent. I turn my head to Aeri and to say the least I'm surprised by the picture of her.

"Tell me then…what would've you done?" Aeri whimpers.

She is shaking, her breathing becomes ragged and she tries her best to hold herself still.

"Aeri, it's not abou-"

"No! Tell me!" she cries, "Tell me what you would've done Billfray! Tell me what you would've done if the person you loved was taken away from you! Tell me!"

For the first time since I've known her, Aeri seems fragile. Tears easily roll off her eyes; they run along her cheeks and fall unto the floor. Her voice is both pained and heavy.

"All of you feel so at ease just pointing fingers," she says, "You all single out each and every single one of the problems but do any of you really understand? I know what I did was wrong, I know it was, trust me I do, but what was I supposed to do then?"

"Aeri…" Ruri mutters and gets close to her.

"Klaus killed the person I fell in love with…" Aeri continue, "Do you any idea of how that feels, Billfray?"

Billfray looks apologetic, as if he deeply regretted ever speaking. He scratches the back of his head and bites his lip before answering.

"I…I don't," he answer.

"I'll tell you," Aeri says and walks closer to him.

She goes around the table and stands exactly in front of Billfray.

"Just try imagining waking up one day to find out the reasons why you thought life was worth living for no longer exist, as if someone stabbed you right here!" Aeri says and harshly sets her palm in the center of Billfray's chest, "and every day you can feel the pain just getting sharper and sharper. It tears you apart…the thought that maybe you could've done something different, that maybe you could've done things another way. "

"Aeri…I'm," Billfray mumbles.

"You feel empty…and alone, like a part of you is gone, and no matter how hard you try you will never be able to get it back," Aeri interrupts him, "That's what it feels like. So, please tell me. What would have you done, Billfray?"

Billfray struggles to find the right words to answer Aeri. He stutters the letter "I" on a loop like some kind of scratched CD. I guess this is what I get for not really bothering to know people. I had a basic idea of what happened to the guild. What this Daath individual meant to everyone, but never did Aeri allow me to see this part of her. This devastated part of her that has been in despair ever since the day she lost this person.

"I'm sorry," Billfray huffs.

Aeri takes a few steps back and turns completely to make a straight line to the bed. Once there she turns around and sits on the very edge of it, still sulking. Ruri sits right next to her and places her arm around her. Aeri let's herself be embraced by Ruri and starts to quietly sob.

Al gets up from his seat and walks around the table, Esra follows him closely and once he stops right in front of Billfray she stops herself.

"We are not here to try and make you believe what we did was right," he says, "We are here to apologize, the conversation might've gone out of control there but it's really what we wanted to do."

"Why us, though?" I ask, "Why only apologize to us right now?"

If the point of this dumb meeting is to apologize, why didn't they ask the others to come? It makes little sense for this to be done away from them, if anything they need to apologize to the people they've known for the longest.

Al chuckles but he only does so to mask something else.

"I thought maybe you were the ones we should start with," He says, "You had nothing to do with what happened before and yet we didn't bother to think about you guys. I would add Hotoka and Siren to this list but…I can't really do that anymore, can I?"

Al arrives to a point I wanted to discuss. They just ran away, as soon as Hotoka started explained what had been happening they felt pressured to leave. And so they have started this apology with us instead of apologizing to the people they've known for the longest time. In my eyes it's a very childish move but after all they are still kids. They ran away from the problem as soon as they could. Not Elina or Ruri gave them chase, they were devastated by the news and the fact that their lovers ran away only weighed heavier on them.

"Why did you guys run away?" Billfray asks, "Why start with us?"

"I can barely face you guys…how do you expect me to face Elina or Kayla?" Al says.

Running away is in fact the easier option in this case, but I think in the end they are all in their way trying to figure out what they are going to say to the rest of the guild.

"I get that but…you guys need to go back," I say.

"It's hard…" Ruri says, "I'm scared."

I just want to cut the crap and scream how dumb this is. Yet I keep silent and watch the room. I know they are just kids, and perhaps I'm being too harsh. I'm just assuming they should do as adults and face up to their mistakes, but they are still kids. Part of me feels hypocritical, but I was forced to grow up faster than other people, and even if I'm just a few years older than the eldest in the group before me I can't help but to think about this whole little scenario they've set up as stupid.

"Just come back home guys, we'll sort this out later," I say, "Either way if what those Coffin guys told Hotoka is true, they should leave us alone now, as long as we keep away from them. So, just come back, alright?"

In the end I will have to swallow up whatever anger I have towards them and just bring them back. That's what an adult would do, or at least I think so. I'll gladly hear them out on their apology but not today, it's not me or Billfray they should be apologizing to. They can do that later, but we shouldn't be the first ones on their lists.

"I'm sorry about all of this," Al says, but it sounds as if he's biting his tongue in the process.

"Just go home, alright?" I ask softly.

* * *

**Aeri**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

I push the door into my room and slowly make my way to the bed, as soon as I reach it I sit on the edge and place my hands over my knees. With the clearing parties notified, the attention of Laughing Coffin should at least for a while not be so focused on us. Besides, they still need to be eliminated; I'll just play a smaller role in that task. If anything I guess I will now actively avoid that role.

I wish I could've noticed before, but I haven't stopped crying. I somehow managed to break even more back in that stupid meeting. I just want this nightmare to be over. I want to wake up already; I want to go back to the real world. For how much longer are we going to be trapped in here?

I wipe my tears off with my hands and try to regulate breathing; stupid pathetic sobs still escape my lips though. I brace myself for anything Mirai might have to comment on the matter but she is surprisingly missing. Part of me wishes that she would just tell me to stop being so stupid, to stop crying and being weak or something but she is nowhere to be seen or heard.

I perk my head up a little as I hear the door creaking open. Sinna pokes her head in and stares in my direction.

"You are back," she says softly.

I sniffle deeply and keep rubbing my eyes as I try my best to not look like a mess.

"Hey, sweetie," I mutter.

"Can, I come in?"

It hurts me that she chooses this of any moment to ask. She's never asked for permission; she always just barged in and even snuck into my bed. She feels so distant with just those words; I got no one to blame but myself though.

"Of course," I say and pat a spot in the bed just next to me.

She walks into the room and closes the door behind her. She walks over to me very slowly, it feels like she is being cautious and that alone only makes me feel worse and worse as her steps become slower the closer she gets to me. She stops right in front of me, she doesn't sit next to me, she chooses to stand up in order to avoid being so close. I intertwine my own fingers and breathe out slowly as I let my head hang a little.

"Is it true?" she asks, "Is Siren dead because of you?"

My mouth dries up and I try districting myself by playing with my fingers. Sadly there's not much I can do to avoid her question, I know she is not stupid and she would absolutely hate me if I treated her as such. I struggle to make my eyes meet hers and nod.

"Yes, it's my fault…" I answer.

Sinna uncomfortably reaches for her shoulder with her right arm and subtly take another step back.

"I…I was kind of wishing what Hotoka said wasn't true," she says softly.

I'm unsure of what to say next so I stay silent, pressing my lips against each other harshly. Sinna starts looking around the room as I leave her with practically nothing else to do. She shifts her stance a little as the seconds pass by and she remains quiet as well.

"You told me you weren't doing bad stuff anymore…" she says.

"Sinna, I'm so-"

"I believed you," she says.

I feel my shoulders get heavy from that sentence alone. I feel the urge to try and excuse myself but if I try to do that things will probably just get worse. She will probably hate me more than she does now.

"You are a bad person Aeri…," she mutters, "You are a killer…no better than the ones who took sis away."

I start crying again; however I manage to keep any sounds from escaping my mouth. Tears just flood my eyes and I feel them roll off my face.

"I'm sorry, Sinna," I groan.

"Did Regi also die because of you?" she presses.

The more she speaks the more pain I feel in my being. My heart aches badly and the tears keep flowing. I have no way of stopping it, nor the strength to try and avoid it. I close my eyes and nod at Sinna.

I hear her pull in air as if something had just taken it all away from her. I open my eyes and see her crying. She almost immediately brings her hands up to her face and starts wiping the tears away. I stand up and try to reach out to her but she takes a step back.

"Why?" she weeps, "Why did you do it?"

"I felt like it needed to be done," I reply, "It felt like the right thing…"

I think I finally did it, I reached my lowest point, there's no way I could feel worse than I already do. There just isn't, there's no way this could hurt more, is there? I sit back down and place my hands back down over my knees. I keep hearing Sinna cry but I can't do anything about it, I fear that if I try to do something she'll just run away.

"You guys will be safe now though, I'm not going to do anything stupid anymore…" I say.

"Why didn't you stop sooner?" she asks and turns around.

She starts walking away and in a last desperate gamble to fix anything, to at the very least make myself feel better I stand up once more and reach out to her. I grab her shoulder and make her stop as she is about to leave the room.

"Hey, uh…aren't you going to sleep here?"

"No, I'm going to go to Aereth's room," she says and walks forward.

My hand slowly slips from her shoulder and I stay still as I watch her exit my room. She opens the door slowly and closes it behind her once she exits. The darkness of my own room surrounds me yet again and an eerie cold feeling runs through my body.

"Well, what were you expecting?" Mirai asks.

Her timing is just something I will never appreciate.

"Something else," I answer.

I see her blurred figure phase in right in front of me, for some reason she looks sad as well. That grin she normally wears to mock is not present in the slightest. Whatever I can make out of her eyes just appears droopy and her lips are softly pressed against each other. It makes me laugh a little.

"Hey, why aren't you making me feel like shit?" I ask.

"Would you like to feel any worse?" she asks.

Does she suddenly care? What's with the sudden change in attitude? I unequip my armor and throw myself over my bed. Sluggishly I get myself under the covers and lay on my stomach. Pressing my face against the cold pillow, I appreciate the sudden silence that envelops the room. I can feel Mirai is close by, but she chooses to remain silent for whatever odd reason. I turn slightly on my side and see her staring at me from one of the corners of the room. I slip my hand under the pillow and adjust my position just slightly, propping myself up a little to look at her.

"I doubt she will ever forgive you, and even if she does," Mirai comments, "she will never look at you the same way."

I chuckle and turn away from her.

"Thanks," I mumble, "I really needed that."

* * *

**Ruri**

My mind is usually crowded with multiple thoughts. I think of what I will do later in the day, of what to do tomorrow, of what I might be doing a few days from now. Not anymore though, I've been thinking about one thing and one thing alone today. I've been thinking about her, I've been thinking of how she looks. Her beautiful blonde hair, the sound of her voice, the way she smells. That's everything that's been on my mind today. I've only been thinking about her.

I'm frozen solid, at the very door of this place I've learned to call home. The one place where I'm supposed to feel safe, yet I suddenly feel stuck and anxious.

"Are you going to stay there for much longer?"

Kayla walks down the stairs of the darkened foyer going past Al in the process and draws closer to the door where I'm standing. She smiles gently and keeps getting closer, I look away as my brain tries to think of something to say.

"Kayla, I'm sorry, I thought that maybe, if I did something about it, may-"

I feel her wrap her arms around me and hold me close to her person.

"I'm glad you are back," she says softly.

"Me too," I whimper as I hug her back.

I feel an almost overwhelming need to just cry in her arms. To say that I'm sorry for lying to her, for going behind her back, I just want to say sorry about everything. I squeeze her tightly as my mind runs the multiple scenarios, the ones where she gets mad, the ones where she is disappointed, the ones where she hates me, the ones where she leaves me. I squeeze her tighter and tighter each passing second.

"Why didn't you tell me anything?" she asks.

I keep squeezing.

"I thought I was keeping you safe," I mutter, "I thought if I did it on my own, I could keep you safe, maybe if we managed to take them out…I could save you from anything. Maybe then we could have been able to live without fear…I thought…I thought."

Her hands move slowly over my back, she places one of them on the back on my head and the other on my upper back. She holds me closer and start shushing me softly.

"It's ok, it's ok," she coos.

I hide my face in her chest and hold her as close as I'm physically able to. I might be hurting her or making her very uncomfortable but she doesn't show any remote trace of it.

"I'm so sorry," I wail, "If something bad were to happen to you…"

I stop as for the first time in ages my feelings get the best of me. My voice breaks and I feel my throat tighten up as I begin to weep like a little child.

"I wouldn't be able to live with myself, knowing it was my fault, I'm so sorry," I cry.

"Hey, clam down, it's ok," she says, "I'm ok."

She grabs my head and pushes me slightly again from her. She holds me so I'm looking at her face, at her beautiful face.

"See?" she says, "I'm alright, I'm here with you."

I feel even more tears coming out of my eyes and I pull her close again, this time cradling my head over her shoulder as I cry and cry.

"Please don't lie to me like that again," she begs.

"I won't, I swear I won't," I struggle, "I won't ever again."

I feel her back away a bit and second slater she presses her lips against my own. Briefly pecking my lips she laughs a bit and then takes hold of my hand.

"Let's go to bed, alright? It's been a long day."

I nod and smile a little.

"Sounds good."

* * *

**Alshep**

I usually try my best to not stick my nose into something that really isn't my business, but Ruri's loud sobs are a bit hard to ignore thanks to the layout of this place. Everything echoes too loudly and even if I'm not meaning to eavesdrop I end up hearing half of the heart to heart both her and Kayla exchange as I go up the stairs. Once I make it to the top floor I see Elina sitting on the floor as she leans over on the door to our room.

"A part of me thinks this would all be easier for me if you had the same reason Ruri claims to have for her actions," she says, not even looking in my direction, "but I know you too well to try and trick myself into thinking that you did everything because of me."

She stands up and opens the door to our room, however she doesn't go inside. She moves her arm and points it into the room.

"Eli, I…"

"We have to talk, that's why you finally came back, no?" she says, "Please come inside."

On her command I start moving and walk past her as I make my way into the room. Once inside I stop somewhere in the middle of the room and turn to see her close the door. She hides her hands behind her back and looks straight at me. I was half hoping to see her cry for some reason, but she is just disappointed. I was also expecting her to be mad, but she just looks at me as if I failed her. It feels far worse than any of the two scenarios I've thought about so far.

"You know," she mutters, "I had a feeling something was off, for the longest time now. I just thought that you would tell me, I always hoped that you would never lie to me."

"Elina, I didn't mean to, I thought tha-"

"I don't want to hear your reasons," she says bitterly, "I'm not even sure if I want to see you right now. I thought that I knew your ins and outs, I thought I knew almost every little thing there was to know about you, Yuuji. Do you know how much it hurts to realize that I was wrong?"

As she uses my real name to address me I just feel worse. The feeling had already been tearing me up from the inside. Lying to her was not something that I at any point enjoyed. I hated keeping this from her, but for some reason in my stupid head I thought it would be the best course of action, I thought that by doing so I would be sparing the worry. Saying sorry at this point would just make things worse, I can't just say sorry and think I'll be free of any consequence. She has every right to be reacting like she is right now.

"Are you even going to say anything?" she asks, though it sounds more like she is begging, "Please, Yuuji, say something, tell me something please."

"Somewhere along the line…I really thought I was doing the right thing," I mutter.

"Killing? Is killing the right thing?" she says, "Please tell me you didn't really feel like you were doing the right thing when you were killing people."

"I'm not sure," I answer lowly.

What feels like an eternity of silence stretches out across the room.

"Could you maybe…" she mumbles, "Leave me alone for tonight? I got to think about some stuff…on my own."

I nod and almost immediately walk towards the door.

"Yeah," I huff, "Yeah, I'll leave now."

As I walk past her once again I can almost feel her disappointment, as if she wanted something more from in this conversation.

"So just like that, huh?" she whispers.

I don't even answer and somewhat reluctantly exit the room. The foyer is now lit up, probably thanks to Esra. I lean a bit over the railing to look downstairs and see her sweeping the floor. I make my way downstairs and pull one of the chairs on the main table. I sit down and rest my arms over the table itself. Esra keeps sweeping for a few seconds before stopping to take a look at me.

"How did it go?" she asks.

"I don't know," I answer, "It feels like it went pretty badly."

"I'm sure Elina will forgive you, Master," she says.

"I'm not so sure, Esra," I sulk.

She stays still and silent for a minute or so and then resumes her sweeping. After ten minutes, maybe more she stores the broom in her inventory and takes out a rag, with it she starts cleaning the table I'm sitting at. The clouds finally part away, enough for the moonlight to pierce in the house, the cold blue light makes a nice contrast with the warm orange hue of the candles around the house.

"Do you remember all those day ago?" I ask as I stare out the window.

"What do you mean, Master?"

"Back in Coldview, when it all started to go downhill," I continue, "You told me that you still thought I would lead you all somewhere great."

"I do," she states.

"I hope I have enough time in my life to apologize for never doing so."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I actually don't enjoy switching POVs multiple times. I think it's something that should be avoided. Nevertheless it serves a purpose in this chapter so while I'm not fully please, I think it works. This chapter makes me all kinds of sad, but it was about time consequences finally got to the gang. Also I hope you notice a few particular things in this chapter, they might be too subtle but there's a bit of hidden meaning in this chapter. Also to clarify something, cause I got a few angry messages as to why PoH speaks in Spanish briefly on the last chapter. DID YOU KNOW?! PoH is well versed in three languages in canon. These being Spanish, English and Japanese. For realises, remember I get my facts from the source content.

**IC0: **Nah you can rest easy for a while, I'm not gonna butcher each soul in my story...probably. Hopefully the wait wasn't to excruciating for you. **Electronic Ink 0: **I'm glad to hear so, hopefully I can also improve it by not killing people haha.

On other news! I was hanging out with a friend of mine the other day and he happens to enjoy my fic so he was all like. "Yoh tell me something you want drawn from your fic!" And I'm like "Well some weapons would be cool." And he sketched Al's , Aeri's, Aereth's and Billfray's in like 10 minutes. So that's really cool and you can take a look at them in the imagur you can find in my profile. So check em out! That's all for this week! If you like what you read please leave a review or don't it's ok ; - ; See you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Together Alone"


	61. Chapter 61 - Together Alone

**Chapter 61: Together Alone **

**March/17th/2024**

**Fifty Sixth Floor of Aincrad – Twenty Fifth Floor of the Bysage Labyrinth**

**Alshep**

"Everyone retreat now!" Aeri yells "Use your crystals or get back to the door dammit!"

While Aeri is ordering the parties around I'm in a staring contest against Skeiron, a griffon kind of thing that just happens to be the boss of floor fifty six. The damn thing screeches as it flaps its wings, the wind it generates hits me with such force I need to change my footing. I see flashes of light on the corners of my eyes; thankfully these are not from dead people but people running away, teleporting to a safer location. I've been focusing a lot in his battle, I even stopped switching with my party, and I'm doing much better on my own anyways.

"Al! Come on!" Aeri screams, "We have to go!"

"No!" I answer, "We can do it! There's only half a health bar to go!"

Skeiron proved to be quite a boring battle just until its very last health bar. The thing barely attacked and the parties were doing such a good job at attacking that we managed to keep it in a staggered state for most of the fight. When we got to the last bar it decided to take off from the ground. Once in the air, any semblance of strategy we had went out the window. Of course there wasn't one to begin with. After all, Aeri and I are leading the first survey battle on this floor.

"We tried our best, just let it go!"

I raise my sword into the air just as Skeiron flexes its claws. I can do it; I just have to be careful. Aeri takes hold of my armed hand and pulls me along with her towards the door. I try to yank away from her hold but she is too strong for me to do so.

"Let go of me!"

She refuses to answer and keeps pulling me to the door of the room. Looking around makes me realize we are the only ones left. Everyone else fled the scene. What a bunch of cowards, we had this thing in the bag and they decide to run away. Pathetic. In what feels like less than a few seconds Aeri has already dragged me out the door where more than a dozen players are trying their very best to get some air into their lungs. Taking a look at them I can't help but to feel irritated, angry. I grab the first poor idiot I can get my hand son and pull him close to me.

"Why did you retreat?!" I ask.

"The raid leader told us to!" he exclaims.

"She is second in command you idiot!" I groan, "You guys are of bunch of cowards! We had this fight in the bag! We had absolutely no casualties!"

"Al," Aeri says.

"We could've been done with this stupid floor!" I fume.

"Al!"

"What?!" I grunt as I turn to Aeri.

"We lost ten people," she replies and suddenly grows quiet, "Look at your health idiot."

Impossible. I had it all under control. We were doing alright. I feel as if I just gained some kind of focus I lost in that boss room. My whole party is completely wiped out; gray names are below my own, five of them. Another thing becomes stingily apparent. The corner of my HUD is flashing red and my health points are but a few light taps away from dropping to zero. Aeri takes my hand and gently places a health potion into my open palm. I press my thumb against the cap of the vial and push it off with ease. I chug it down in a few drinks and look around me once again.

"Everyone…" I say, "We are done for today, we'll report back to the clearing guilds."

Expecting a wave of complaints I ready myself, but none arise. Some of the players disappear with the flash of a crystal while others walk down the corridor to make their way down the labyrinth on foot. I sheathe my sword and go to the nearest wall to sit my sorry ass down. I slide down the wall and rest my back against it.

"Dammit!" I groan and slam my fist against the wall.

Aeri shuffles around awkwardly as she watches every other player leave the area. She unequips her gauntlets and runs her hands through her hair, looking a bit anxious.

"What were you thinking?" she asks.

"I don't think I was…" I admit.

"You could've died there…" she mutters.

I swallow my own spit and sigh.

"I thought we could do it, we were so close…" I reply.

In a matter of seconds we are left completely alone, the only sound in the immediate area is that of Skeiron screeching and its wings making an awfully audible sound as it flaps them around. Aeri get close to me and stops but a few feet away from me.

"Don't die on me…" she mumbles.

I'm oddly struck with the emotions she infuses in those words. She sounds morbidly worried and at the brink of crying but taking a look at her face only reveal that she is very serious about it.

"I'm sorry," I say while looking at her.

"Don't be," she says softly and sits next to me, "Just don't do something like that again."

I nod and sort of unconsciously rest a bit of my weight on her. I can feel her do the same and she then tilts her head against mine. Lately I've been spending a lot of time with Aeri, after the events that took Siren's life and made Hotoka leave the guild we've found it hard to be around the guild or the guild house for that matter. In a way we've been enjoying each other's company. So we have been questing together a lot and getting involved in clearing affairs. All to the point where we have been appointed raid leaders of survey fights. Something that Asuna made sure we considered more than three times. Sadly given how we've really had nothing to do as of late we agreed upon it. This has been our first day on the job and I'm unsure if we made a good job at all. Losing people is more than obviously a bad thing but we gathered pretty much all there is to know about the boss. Now it's just a matter of reporting back to the guilds. Namely the KoB since they seem to have the biggest presence out of all the guilds.

"So how does this work?" Aeri asks, "Do we go to Asuna or Heathcliff?"

"I would rather meet Asuna first and give her the run down," I admit, "That old guy gives me a bad vibe…"

"I'll message her," Aeri say and with a grunt gets up from the floor.

She pats down her legs and then offers her hand for me to get up. Taking hold of it I stand up on my feet and look back at the door that leads to boss room. As if mocking me Skeiron is now sitting on the very center of the room, staring at me. It's a very hard blow to my ego. Perhaps if was paying attention during the fight we could've moved on to the next floor today, but my head isn't in the right place. Ten people died because of that but for some reason that doesn't weigh very heavily on me. The one thing bothering me is that I didn't kill the boss.

I start walking along side Aeri, creating distance between us and the boss. I can see how Aeri is typing out a message to Asuna on her menu, meanwhile in deep silence I start thinking of what exactly I'm going to say to Asuna. Skeiron a griffon with three health bars. Its attack patterns show that at the very least it has four ways to attack players. Using its beak, claws, body and tail. Puncture attacks prove to be quite efficient at staggering the boss, even more so if the attacks are concentrated on its limbs. Once the last bar of health is reaches the boss will take to the air and circle the room, attacking the player with only its claws and beak. We were close to killing it but as we suffered casualties we realized there was no other option than to leave.

"I forgot you can't send messages while in dungeons and stuff…" Aeri complains, "I'll just draft it."

I nod at her and we make our way down each and every one of the floors in the Labyrinth. We should really invest in crystals but when it comes to health or transport ones I will always choose the one that fills up your health bar. Even with the amount of col we earn this high into Aincrad crystals are still super expensive. We don't talk to each other all the way, we just stay close to each other, oddly I can't help but to notice the way we walk, we are oddly in synch. Once on the first floor we reach the cave like opening that serves as the entrance to the Bysage Labyrinth. It's incredibly bright outside but I can make out a familiar silhouette on the other end. Asuna stands at the very entrance of the labyrinth. She holds what looks like a basket and as I get closer and get a better look at her face I realize she isn't exactly in the best of moods. Thankfully it doesn't look like she is about to give us a mouthful but rather that she is ready to give us a pat on the back.

I raise my hand a bit and wave at her, she smiles softly and turns away as we reach her.

"I thought maybe I would surprise you two with some food after your first survey fight," she says softly, "From the people that came out before you…I guess it didn't go as well as we expected."

"Can we eat before we say anything about what happened?" Aeri asks.

Asuna nods slowly, unsure of her decision, after all she is technically an official, but first and foremost she is our friend. She leads us a few meters away from the entrance and sits over picnic sheet. It seems she had already thought about some little kind of celebration, it makes me feel bad that we ended up disappointing her. Aeri and I sit next to each other and once again in that odd synch we cross our legs.

"You guys alright?" Asuna asks.

"Yeah," we both answer in unison.

"Right," Asuna nods and uncovers the basket she was carrying.

Inside of the neatly arranged basket you can find a few sandwiches, they look amazing and I can feel myself salivate once I set my eyes on them. The pork chop contrasts neatly with the white bread that encloses it. It looks kind of juicy but at the same time just by looking it I know that taking a bite of it will definitely make a nice crunching sound once my teeth close down on it. Next to the sandwiches there's about four rice balls leaning against each other. I'm used to praising Esra's food but the one time Asuna cooked for us completely blew Esra out of the water. With this being the second and with me still yet to even try the food I can just say the same. It looks great, it smells great and I'm more than sure that it will taste great.

I move a bit forward and reach for one of the sandwiches, taking it into my hand I can feel the warmth of the probably recently cooked pork chop emanating through the white bread. Not wasting another second and take the thing to my mouth and like some kind of starved dog bite into it. Just as expected, it's amazing.

"This is amazing," I say while not even done with the food in my mouth.

"Glad you like it," Asuna says with a smile.

"It tastes great," Aeri says, "It really does."

Asuna's eyes widen briefly and she places her index finger on her chin.

"I wanted to talk with you about something!" she gasps, "It's about the deal with those Laughing Coffin guys."

The food in my mouth takes a turn to the sour and avoiding a weird urge to spit it out I swallow it. I clench what's left of the sandwich in my hand and cough to clear my throat.

"What about them?" Aeri asks, sounding withdrawn.

"We've captured a handful of them," Asuna says, "They are surprisingly loyal, none of them have given up any kind of information."

That may be because they aren't asking the right questions. I turn my head to Aeri and see her solely fixated on her meal. She holds the sandwich with both hands and slowly she takes little bites out of it. Then again, the way Aeri asked questions wasn't something the clearing guilds with be comfortable with doing.

"I see…" Aeri replies, "I hope you can stop those guys soon."

"Don't worry, we will," Asuna says with optimism, "It'll just take a while, they are very well hidden. I'll be sure to keep you updated though."

"Thanks," Aeri replies.

I take the last of my food and stuff it in my mouth before realizing Asuna is now staring at me rather intensely. She pushes the basket closer to me and chuckles awkwardly.

"The rice balls are also pretty good," she says, "try them."

In a way I can see through her, she wants to be briefed on how things went during the boss fight. However I'm not exactly in the best of moods and I really want to be done eating before I give her the rundown. I grab one of the rice balls and start eating it, just like she said, they are pretty good. I'm about to take the second bite out of the thing when I lower my arm and just set it over the sheet Asuna went through the trouble of setting down.

"Ok, so this is what happened during the boss fight…" I groan.

"No, no," Asuna says, "You guys eat before any of that."

"I don't care, I just want to be done with it," I say, "So listen up."

* * *

**Fifty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Granzam – Knights of the Blood HQ**

"You neglected one of the few guidelines we gave you," Heathcliff lectures.

It's kind of funny that the guild leaders only ever get together at times like these. Were this some kind of strategy meeting Lind would be a complete no show and I can bet Thinker would've sent Yulier in his stead. They are all here though, because they want to point their fingers at me, not that I can blame them, after all it is technically my fault the people from their guilds are now dead. I sigh and turn my head a bit to look at Asuna who is sitting next to me on the meeting table.

I resent her a little for forcing me into coming here after I told her everything. I know it's her job but it almost feels as if a friend dragged me right into the wolves' den.

"You were supposed to pull back at the very first sign of danger," Thinker says, "Why did you choose to do otherwise?"

"I was under the impression that we were handling the situa-" I start.

"You were under the impression?!" Lind interrupts, "Your dumb ass just cost my guild three people!"

I grind my teeth against each other all the way through Lind's sentence and then try my best to appear not at all bothered by the fact that he just interrupted me.

"As I was going to say, I was under the impression we were handling the situation," I say, "After all we managed to drive the boss' health to its last health bar."

"Impressive as that may be, your stubbornness took the lives of people," Thinker adds.

I feel pressure building up in my head. I know the freaking guys are supposed to be top of the line players, but who the hell do they think they are? Am I not allowed to make mistakes? Are they perfect or something?

"We'll review the matter and take a closer look at your report," Heathcliff says, "I'm aware that you and Aeri are the only ones willing to take the lead on these survey battles but if this is the kind of outcome we are to expect, I'm not sure if you are the right option."

"Oh shut up…" I grunt.

"Excuse me?" Heathcliff huffs.

"I said shut up," I repeat myself.

"Al," Asuna murmurs, "Let it go."

I stand up and jump on top of the table. I can stand the criticism, I can accept the fact that I screwed up but I will not be treated like some kind of idiot. No, not by these cowards. I'm yet to see any of these bastards put their asses on the line.

"You guys feel like almighty beings, don't you?" I huff, "Sitting here, having your stupid meetings, sending people to fight the monsters you are afraid of."

"Alshep," Heathcliff calls, "I would suggest you calm down."

"And I suggest you shut up and wait until I'm done talking," I growl.

"What are you talking about?!" Lind stands up, "I've participated on several of the boss fights."

I chuckle and press my palm against my temple.

"Oh Lind, listen here, I know that out of all the people in this table you are the one with the most balls but that doesn't change the fact that you are stupid," I spit, "Let me just return to the point I wanted to discuss though…"

I clear my throat and see that Thinker gets up from his seat. He is about to speak when I place my index finger on top of my lips and silently shush him.

"You guys claim to be the best of the best, yet you send me and a handful of people to do this stupid recon battles," I say, "I get the logic behind it, but why aren't any of you there? Oh, right, because sending people that don't matter in first is easy."

None of the leaders dares to speak after my words. I know I'm right; they need their poster boys and girls to be alive for the real battles. That's the reason why Asuna was not allowed to come with us even if when she begged to come along. That's why they send people that no one will miss into the survey battles.

"Now, I'm willing to keep leading people into hell for you assholes," I state, "But don't you dare talk down on me when shit you guys are too afraid to even look at goes sideways. "

I step down from the table and walk to the doors leading out of the meeting room.

"I'll send my report to Asuna," I say as I open the doors, "Good luck to whoever you guys send to kill that thing."

I kick the doors open and walk out as soon as I'm physically able to do so. The doors creak loudly and the sound the hinges make almost make it sound like the damn doors are about to give out. Aeri is leaning on a wall not too far from the meeting room, once she sees me coming out of the room she joins me.

"I guess it didn't go well," she says.

"Rather not talk about it," I say.

"Ok then, I won't' ask," she mutters, "Want to go to the usual spot?"

"Sure thing," I huff, "I need to relax a bit."

* * *

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Sekehx Pond**

It has become some sort of routine for us to stop by this pond and just relax. Neither of us is too eager to go back to the guild house so we just try to spend as much time as possible outside. Even if it means that we just lay down on the ground next to a small pond.

Lying down on the soft grass is nice from time to time. It's not every day this floor in particular is sunny and clear of clouds. There's a gentle breeze going around and breathing in I can harbor some of its coolness. Aeri moves around a bit besides me, it would seem she can't find a comfortable position to lie in. I can hear the sound of her armor slightly clanking with its plates and the fabric of her clothes brushing against the blades of grass lasts more than a few seconds until she gives up and sits up. She sighs out, seemingly in annoyance but in this last month or so I have to admit I've seen her appear calmer than ever before. I still approach the topic with caution but I can't help but to be curious whenever I'm alone with her, which as of late has been a normal thing.

"Do you still see her?"

She takes a few seconds to answer.

"Lately she hasn't bothered me that much," she says, "It's almost as if she lost the will to make me feel miserable."

"Well, that's good no?" I ask, "The less you see of that weird hallucination the best."

"I guess so," she says slowly.

"Is she here right now?" I ask.

"No, not right now," she answers.

If I were to guess I would say that it's odd for her to finally have this presence finally winding down. After all, what she has told me about this blurred girl is that all she used to do was tease her and abuse her verbally. I stretch my hands out and then extend them to the sides. I place my hand over Aeri's hand in a weird awkward reflex I yank my hand away.

"Sorry," I huff.

"Nah, it's ok."

I turn my head slightly to the side, enjoying the way the grass scratches the back of my head and find myself staring at Aeri's hand. She is resting them on the ground, just at her sides. With her thumb and index fingers she pinches the grass and pulls on it, plucking the blades of green off the ground.

"Say…" she mutters.

"Yeah?"

"Are things with Eli any better? Last time I asked you said she still barely talks to you…" she says.

I place my hands behind my head and close my eyes before breathing out slowly.

"Still the same, I actually think it's just getting worse," I admit.

"That's kind of harsh of her," she says, "Do you…try to talking to her?"

"I'm done trying…" I admit, "Whenever I tried getting a hold of her she just seems irritated or like she isn't even in the conversation. The first few times it really tore me up, but now it just pisses me off. Even more so because she claims to be in the process of forgiving me…what the hell is that supposed to mean?"

I open my eyes and turn my body on its side to face Aeri. She rests her back once again on the ground and also turns her body to face me. She is rather close and she draws her hands closer as she continues to pluck grass off the ground with her right hand.

"That sucks," she says.

"It does," I huff.

My gaze is drawn to her hand, seeing her repeat the same pinching and pulling motion for maybe are minute or so. I look at her as I really have nothing else to do and see that she is also just staring at herself tearing the grass off the ground.

"What about you?" I ask, "Does Sinna still avoid you?"

She laughs a bit and stops pulling on the grass.

"Not just her, the only ones that seem to notice me are Esra, Aereth and you," she says, "Everyone else just gives me the stink eye or avoid even going near me all together."

"Heh, at least you aren't sleeping on the couch," I say trying to lift a bit of the heaviness in the topic.

She chuckles briefly and then her eyes slowly fix themselves on my own.

"You could sleep in my room," she says.

Where this any other person or under any other situation I would immediately decline but for some reason I don't. I stare back at her and nod very subtly. I know there might be something behind this, but I find it hard to care. Should I care? I have some conflicting feelings on the matter but it's easy for me to just discard them.

"I'll think about it," I murmur, "Thanks."

"Anytime," she says.

I see her hand go down and she gets a hold my own. I just look at her movements; I fail to react or do anything on my own. She just takes hold of my hand and squeezes it tightly with her own.

"I kind of like spending time with you, lately…" she admits.

"Hmm, I do too," I say.

She smiles and lets go of my hand. She pulls her arm closer to her again and resumes pinching the grass off the ground.

"Can we…" she mutters, "I know you and Daath were always against that…but I've always been curious."

"What are you talking about?" I ask.

"Can we share our names?" she asks, "Like our real names…I mean."

I think it over for a few seconds and answer rather quickly.

"My name is Yuuji," I say.

I'm surprised as to how effortlessly it comes out of my mouth; it just rolls off with ease. I think back to when I shared names with Elina, she had to force me into doing it, however, right now it came with ease and without me feeling bad or unsecure about it.

Aeri smiles widely with her eyes closed, laughing for a few seconds. Appropriately I smile a little as well.

"You totally look like a Yuuji," she smiles.

"I do?" I chuckle.

She nods and slowly sits back up. I do the same and look at her, waiting for her to reveal her own name. I'm about to ask her myself when she speaks.

"I'm Mirai," she says softly.

We converse through most of the afternoon, I end up sharing quite a bit of my life back in the real world and she does the same. As hard as it is for me to believe it turns out that Mirai used to be an Idol with a moderate following. Not like I would ever know, I was never too much into idol culture. However I find it easy to believe her, the way she talks about it feels like it's charged with honesty. Compared to her I lead a very stale looking life back in the real world. Once the sun starts to hide we both agree to head back home. It's already late when we get back to the guild house as the streets in Barrowdell are almost empty. A sight that you can only be witness at this time at night.

"Welcome back, Master. Welcome back, Aeri," Esra greets us once we go inside.

"Hey," I say, "Anyone home?"

"Everyone is here Master, if I'm not mistaken, they should all be in their rooms," she says, "It is a bit late Master."

I walk over to the couch in the living room like area and sit myself over it. Aeri walks to the stairs and heads up one floor to her room.

"Good night," she says.

"Good night," I reply.

"Good night Aeri," Esra seconds.

I lean back on the couch and through my menu take everything off but my shirt and pants. I sigh out probably a bit too loudly and Esra approaches me from the side.

"How did the survey battle go, Master?" she asks.

"Could've gone better," I say, "Can we not talk about this now? I'm really tired."

"I'm sorry," she mutters.

"It's alright."

She goes away to one of the storage rooms and comes back with a pillow and few sheets. I have been sleeping on the couch but at the very least Esra has been making it a bit more comfortable for me.

"Elina is yet to forgive you?" she asks.

"Is it that obvious?" I retort.

She hands me the pillow and I set it on the end of the couch. After that I grab the sheets and place them next to me. I'm tired but not nearly enough to just try to go and sleep at this moment. Esra waits for a few more seconds in silence. She usually does before asking me if she can leave, something I've told her several times she doesn't have to do, but she insists.

"Is there anything else I can help with?" she asks, "If not, I think I will be taking my leave for today."

"Yeah, go to sleep, thanks for everything."

"Good night, Master," she says with a little bow and retreats to her room.

Finally being left alone I start reflecting on my shitty day. I think back on the battle and I'm still mad at the fact that I probably could've killed that damn boss, it's now up the clearing parties and I guess I just have to wait for them to beat that thing before they call me again. I scratch the back of my head and look around, it's dark and everything feels so still right now. If only this feeling could be present at all times in my life.

I lean back on the couch and my head slowly turns to look at Aeri's door on the second floor. It was nice talking to her, the first time I've really let loose in a while. It was easy to talk to her, it felt nice.

"What the hell am I thinking?" I mumble to myself.

I rub my eyes with both of my hands and sigh out. I stand up and head for the stairs not giving a second thought to what I'm about to do. As if I were sneaking around and try my hardest to avoid generating any noise as I go up the stairs. Once on Aeri's floor I make my way to her door and stand right in front of it.

"Shit…" I mumble.

I raise my hand and close it into a fist, ready to knock on Aeri's door. My hand is already going against the wooden door when I stop myself. Just what the hell am I doing? I turn around and take a few steps away from the door when I hear it creak open. I turn my head to see Aeri standing right under the frame of her door. She is wearing a big, loose t-shirt that ever so slightly slips from one of her shoulders.

"This was a mistake, sorry," I mutter and turn away to head for the stairs.

She takes hold of my arm and pulls on me softly. She could've easily stopped me dead on my tracks but she chooses to do so gently this time around.

"You want to come in?" she asks.

"No, I'm sorry, it was just a mistake," I huff.

She keeps pulling me, making me take steps closer and closer to her. I could back away I could make her unhand me but I don't and she knows this.

"Come on, Yuuji," she says, "Stay, just for tonight."

Once she says my name she lets go of my arm and goes back into her room. She leaves me in the middle of the hallway, expecting me to follow her. I look back at the stairs quickly and then back at Aeri's open door. I put one foot in front of the other and take hold of the door knob. I look outside into the hallway once more as if expecting to see someone, no one is there though.

Aeri's room feels isolated from the rest of the house as the last thing I hear as I close the door is the sound the sound of the latch falling into place. The room is almost pitch black, but I can make out Aeri's silhouette moving towards the end of the room, close to her bed. She chuckles softly with a carefree tone.

"Come on, Yuuji," she whispers.

I should be feeling something right about now, something that would tell me to turn back, to exit this room. There's nothing, nothing at all. I take a few steps farther into the room but suddenly stop as I hear her voice once again speak in the soft, almost melodic tone.

"Come closer."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I really do wonder if I'll get any flak for this chapter, I really think I will but who knows. We are drawing ever closer to the end of my story as I've said once or twice already and things need to fall nicely into place. AT least I think they will and so far I need to express I think this story has surpassed my expectations. To get so many views and to see the reviews you people leave really make me glad I'm doing this.

**Electronic Ink 0: **Yeah I don't really enjoy fabricating unreal scenarios so even withing this story I try to keep human relationships and such as real as possible while still jamming in the usual anime cliche or whatever haha.

That is all for this week, sadly I would like to state the following, I want to take a week to go through my past chapters and fix whatever dumb mistake might be in them. And also next week is my birthday! So I sort of just want to go through my stuff, fix it and be back later with a new chapter! I might not fall through on this and you might see a chapter next Sunday but as for now please consider that there might not be an update next week. As always if you like what you read or not please leave a review!

I will see you all soon!


	62. Chapter 62 - Burnout

**Chapter 62: Burnout**

**March/24th/2024**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – City of Barrowdell – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House**

**Aereth**

"You got any threes?" Kayla asks.

"Go fish," I huff.

"Ahh, what the hell, do you have anything at all?!" she complains as she reaches for a card in the pool.

"It's not your turn to ask," I reply with a faint smile.

After a nice dinner, we opted for playing some cards in my room. Kayla, Ruri, Elina, Billfray, and I sit in some weird kind of circle on the floor next to my bed. A nice change of pace, normally everyone would go their own way and we wouldn't see each other until breakfast. Al and Aeri said they couldn't grace us with their presence since they had business to attend to, to which they left right after eating. My best guess is that they probably got summoned by the clearers or something of the sort. That or they just don't want to be around, given how they exactly haven't been feeling welcome around everyone here. I go out of my way to sometimes chat with Aeri but it's really hard to do so since we never really used to casually chat to begin with.

Ruri thoroughly analyzes the cards in her hands and sticks out her tongue in the process. I chuckle and stretch a bit while making sure no one is able to get a peek at my cards. I look down to see Sinna still taking a nap, using my lap as a pillow. I pass my cards to my left hand and pat her head with my right. I can feel myself smile; subtly I cover my mouth and try to pass it off as a cough. All of this is nice in a way, but I can't help to feel that even then the atmosphere is a little heavy, in particular when taking a look at Elina. I've gotten to know her quite a bit, before what happened with Hotoka and Siren she used to be all smiles. Now she just looks bummed out all of the time, I'm willing to bet it has a lot to do with her and Alshep not talking a lot anymore. After all they are boyfriend and girlfriend; it only makes sense for her to be like this. Although, she seems to look even more dejected recently. However I will not butt in, none of my business really.

I hear a knock on the door and turn my body a little bit.

"Come on in," I say.

The door opens and in comes Esra with a massive tray of snacks and a tea kettle.

"I thought maybe you guys would like something to drink," she says with a smile, "I also brought a few snacks."

"Thank you Esra!" Ruri sings.

Out of all the fallout from the thing with Hotoka and Siren, Esra is the one that came out neutral. No one really has anything against her and since she basically cooks all our meals it was hard for Kayla and Billfray to stay mad at her. Following the white haired girl everyone thanks Esra as she carefully sets the tray on the floor close to us. She gets on her knees and neatly places her hands on top of her lap.

"Who wants some tea then?" she asks.

Everyone raises their hands and with a soft chuckle Esra starts pouring tea for all of us. She passes me a small cup and I thank her. I take a small sip of my cup and sigh out in satisfaction.

"Here," she says as she gives me another cup, "Just so Sinna can have some when she wakes up."

"Oh, right," I say and set my cup on the floor just in front of me, "thanks."

I grab the other cup and place just next to mine.

"Alright, alright," Ruri mumbles, "Let's keep playing here!"

"Why don't you stay?" Kayla proposes, "You can join us on the next round."

"I don't know if I should," Esra replies.

"Come on, Al is not even here right now," Ruri says, "I'm sure you can take a break."

Esra hesitates but ends up sitting with us and pours herself some tea. Kyla scooches over a little bit and let's Esra sit between me and her as we continue to play this round. I breathe in deeply and stare at my cards; I'm two cards shy of having two full books. I can only hope no one asks for twos or fives.

"Hmm, do you have any twos?" Ruri asks me.

I'm one card shy of having on full book. Unwillingly and feeling defeated I hand over three twos and watch as Ruri gleefully takes one of her cards to drop down a full book of twos. It's now Elina's turn and she breathes in deeply, I can't help but noticing a heavy feeling of sadness as she does. Everyone else notices as I can see Esra suddenly staring away as she taps her fingers on the side of her cup of tea. Kayla shrugs and looks in Ruri's direction to see her do the same. Billfray seems to be the only that doesn't really notice as he stares at his own cards. I try my best to just shrug it off as well, but seeing a girl like that just pokes at something inside me. However, it is none of my business so I should probably not ask anything about it.

"You have any fives?" Elina asks Kayla.

"Go fish," Kayla replies.

"Right…" Elina sighs as she reaches for another card.

As she takes another card into her hand and inspects it for a brief second she sighs yet again. We keep playing for a while; we go fishing like nobody's business until for some reason every time Ruri asks for a card she seems to be able to drop a book or two in a few turns.

"Hehe," she giggles mischievously, "I don't know how the strip version of this would even work but I can't help but to feel all of you would be naked."

"You are picturing all of us naked, aren't you?" Kayla asks, her tone not even showing the slightest sign of surprise.

"Of course not!" Ruri answers quickly with a short laugh behind her breath, "Kinda…maybe."

Kayla leans her body closer to her girlfriend and quickly flicks at her forehead. Ruri complains in an over dramatic way but is quick to chuckle after doing so. Ruri then throws herself at Kayla and cards go flying into the air as they start trying to tickle each other.

"Well that's not random at all…" Billfray sighs as he throws his cards into the pool.

Elina throws her cards in as well and drags herself back a little to rest her back against my bed. I guess we are not playing anymore. I find myself once again gently patting Sinna's head but this time I don't stop myself nor care if anyone is looking.

"You too have always been close, right?" Esra asks.

I almost flinch at the question but then just awkwardly laugh.

"Well…no," I answer, "I don't know if I could even tell you that we are close right now."

"Come on," she says as she reaches out and pushes a bit of Sinna's hair out of her face, "This cutie trusts you with her life."

"I hardly think that has anything to do with being close," I say.

"Hmmm," she mutters, "If you say so."

There's a sudden knock at my door and Esra stands up at lightning speed. She pats down the skirt of her outfit and brings her hands to her face. Kayla's and Ruri's laughter only grows louder as they continue their nonsense.

"I wasn't at the door to welcome them back…." Esra squeaks

"Geez, calm down," Billfray chuckles.

"Come on in!" I yell over the sound of the two girls laughing like idiots as they roll on the floor.

The door opens and Alshep peeks in, he looks tired and his armor shows that he probably was in a fight not too long ago.

"Sorry, haha," he laughs, "It's just that we didn't see anyone and we just sort of followed the laughs."

He steps into my room and shortly after Aeri does the same, her armor also showing some tear from a recent battle. She doesn't say a thing; she stands close to Alshep and carefully looks around the room. I raise my hand and wave at her. She smiles a bit but then her expression changes to one of shock. Confused I try to trace her sight and come up with the fact that she is staring in my direction. I turn my head a little to the right and see Elina bitterly staring in Aeri's direction. Her eyebrows completely lowered the look alone spewing nothing but annoyance at the very sight of Aeri. I suddenly have all kinds of questions.

"You guys mind if we join in for a while?" Alshep asks, sounding unsure of his own question.

I half expect at least Kayla and Billfray to oppose the idea, its childish how they are dealing with this. Everyone has been avoiding both Al and Aeri as of late. Ruri I suspect has only been doing so because Kayla still holds a bit of a grudge for what happened.

"Meh…" Kayla utters, "Sure, why not?"

"I don't mind," Billfray says.

I raise an eyebrow as I hear the two answers I wasn't really expecting. I feel sort of proud for some reason. To see that they are finally sort of moving away from what happened makes me rather glad.

Ruri nods and Esra just walks over to stand behind her master.

"I do mind," Elina says acidly.

Everyone then turns their gaze to Elina and judging on how their faces change I take it they are all surprised by Elina's expression alone. Ruri coughs and then scratches the back of her head, the silence the whole situation is generating is enough to let everyone in the room hear the sound of Ruri's nails scratching herself.

"Ahh…geez, uh," Ruri mumbles, "Come on Eli, just one game or something…"

"No," Elina replies.

Alshep breathes in deeply and with his right hand brushes just under his nose. Seconds later he lets the air out through his nose.

"Eli-"

"I don't want you here," she interrupts Alshep, "Or HER for that matter!"

Sinna springs up from her nap once Elina yells and in her confused drowsiness she holds my arm hides behind me.

"What's going on?" she whispers.

I shush her softly and pat her hands that are tightly grabbing my arm.

"Alright," Al mutters, "Ok…"

He turns around and leaves the room with both Esra and Aeri following him. The door closes and we are thrown back into that awkward silence of just a few seconds ago. Elina's voice starts to escape her lips once more but this time she is sobbing, softly crying as she covers her face. Billfray stands up and walks over the mess of cards we've created on the floor of my room. He stops for a second next to me and softly prods my side with his foot.

"Come on, let's get some ale from the kitchen," he says.

"What?" I ask confused.

"Let's go. Get. Some. Ale," he stresses.

I turn to Elina who is now surrounded by Sinna, Kayla and Ruri. Right, I guess I'm getting some ale. I get on my feet and follow Billfray out of the room. We make our way down the stairs and then enter the kitchen where Esra seems to be taking care of the dirty dishes used for today's dinner. She takes a quick look at us and then returns to her current task.

"Hey," I say, "So what was that all about?"

Billfray looks at me in a way that only tells me that he expected me to know about whatever happened. I shrug and he turns away to get two mugs. He walks over to a barrel in the corner and fills both of the mugs to the brim with ale.

"I'm sort of surprised you don't know about what happened," he says.

"I don't really like poking my head in something that's not my business," I answer and then sigh, "Yet, I'm asking you..."

"Well…hmm, haha it's funny that you notice the irony," he says, "To cut it short, apparently Al cheated on Elina."

"Huh?" I exclaim, "Christ, don't tell me..."

I reach for my face with my free hand softly spread my palm across my face as I wait for Billfray's inevitable answer.

"Yup, with Aeri," he says.

"How did everyone even come to find out about it?" I ask, feeling uncomfortable.

"I just heard about it from Ruri," he says and takes a sip of his ale, "I have to say, it sucks to know how the poor girl found out herself. Really shitty way to find out…"

I feel myself getting a bit irritated as I can only feel Billfray is stirring the conversation in a way in which I'm more or less forced to keep asking him questions. I sigh and take a long swig from my drink.

"What do you mean?" I ask.

"Well, turns out, Elina's straining ability is pretty high," he says, "And she heard everything…every single thing going on one floor below her."

That is indeed a pretty shitty way to find out you are being cheated on. Out of sheer awkwardness I finish my drink and take a few steps towards where Esra is still cleaning the dishes. She takes the mug from my hands and smiles before proceeding to clean the mug itself and rinse it with water. It's not like I can say I'm surprised, things have been nothing more than drama lately. I guess it just feels weird to know about this issue. Things have been going downhill but for some reason I had hope that if one thing was to prevail, that thing would be love.

"Does he know?" I ask, "I mean like, does he know that everyone know?"

"I'm pretty sure he doesn't, but if Eli keeps acting like this it's just a matter of time," Billfray comments.

"I think all of us just need some kind of break," Esra butts in.

Billfray brings his mug close to his lips once more and takes a long sip to accentuate Esra's words. I pull down my menu and take a look at I quest I have for floor thirty two. I don't like prying into people's business, but I guess it's just something you have to do sometimes.

"I think I have an idea," I say.

* * *

**Thirty Second Floor of Aincrad – Havenhollow Grove**

East of Winterway Settlement about an hour or so of walking you can find a whole different biome. The tundra-like environment changes completely to a rather humid grove. The game has the place registered as a grove but the place is more like a small forest if anything. While I took residence up in the settlement I made it a task to travel here every week, there's a tree that bears a particular fruit that you can sell for a lot of col in markets. In of my weekly visits I found an albino deer, it was a beautiful sight, and once I saw it, it activated a quest for me. The quest itself is pretty simple; you just have to catch the damn thing, the problem is that this forest is so densely populated by trees that I lost sight of it a few minutes after I started giving it chase. Bringing more people along will surely finally make it so I can finish the quest. As Esra said, we all need some kind of breather, the air cold out here and the scenery is just beautiful, so in a way, I hope it helps.

"Hey…" Elina says.

I look to my right and see that she's made her way close to me, everyone else is spread out through the trees, trying to find the animal I described to them earlier.

"Yeah?" I huff.

"I think I know why you are doing this," she says.

"What are you talking about?" I play dumb.

"You know," she says and sighs as she looks around, as if making sure no one is close enough to listen.

"I have no idea what you are talking about," I mutter.

"Geez, I mean you are taking us all here, in the middle of the night," she says, "To do some random quest or whatever…I'm sure you know about what happened, Billfray probably told you."

She looks immensely uncomfortable as she says this, she is twiddling with her fingers and going to great lengths in order to avoid for our eyes to meet. I'm not about to tell her why I'm doing this even if she pretty much has it figured out by now.

"Tell me what?" I answer.

She chuckles for a second and I stop to take a look around the darkened forest. As I scan the distance I can't help it but to take a look at Elina as I turn around. She smiles at me and tilts her head a little.

"Thanks."

"It's nothing really," I sigh.

"I found it!" Ruri yells.

Elina runs along with me to the direction in which we hear Ruri's voice. We reach her along with everyone else and we all catch a glimpse of the pure white animal a few feet away.

"Huh, I got the quest now as well," Billfray says as he checks his menu.

"Yup, I got it too," Kayla says.

"Hey! Let's make a bet here," Ruri says, "First to catch that thing gets five thousand col from everyone else."

"So, thirty thousand in winnings?" Esra asks.

"Yes!" Ruri replies as she puffs her chest out.

Elina starts running, getting a head start on all of us. The deer appears startled and starts running away from Elina through the forest.

"Hey that's chea-" Ruri complains as Billfray nudges her out of the way to give chase to the animal.

Kayla laughs as she herself starts following the animal. Esra jumps to the branches of a tree above and starts hopping from branch to branch in order to advance. I feel someone take hold of my hand and starts pulling me forward.

"Come on, let's go," Sinna says with a smile.

My feet give in to her pulling and leaving poor Ruri behind we all start bucking it in order to catch up with the deer. I can see the animal in the distance and it gracefully traverses the forest with what appears to be no effort whatsoever. In front of me Kayla has already avoided tripping once or twice but the terrain and trees all around the place make it hard to have an even footing. I can hear Esra hopping above us, the leaves rustle and the hard tap of her shoes on the branches is a rather distinct sound to just misplace as some sort of animal above.

"Hey guys, come on!" Ruri yells in the distance, "This isn't fair!"

Elina is just a few feet from catching the deer when she jumps at it. The deer literally turns its head around to look at Elina lunging at it and jumps just slightly to the side, avoiding her completely. Elina crashes into the ground and Kayla dashes past her with no second thought. Elina is quick to recover and starts running once more. Sinna and I catch up to her, she seems a little out of breath.

"You were so close!" Sinna says in awe.

"Yeah, I almost grabbed it," Elina heaves.

"Give it another try," I say.

Elina nods and with a face that yells that she is straining herself picks up more speed, leaving us behind. Sinna is struggling to catch her breath as we run when Billfray seemingly out of nowhere appears on my side and picks her up. He places her on his shoulders and laughs.

"Hold on tight," he says.

"Aha!" Sinna exclaims, "Go Billfray!"

Extending her right arm ahead she points in the deer's direction and laughs. The chase through the grove becomes rather frantic, the white animal outsmarts us at every turn. I can't help to think how much harder this would be if the quest took place back in Winterway. The thing would probably be able to blend in with the snow to a certain point.

The leaves rustle wildly above me and Esra lands just a few inches to my left.

"It's like it's leading us somewhere," she says.

"Huh?"

"I don't know, it feels like it's following a path," she explains.

"I doubt it, it feels like we've been going in circles," I say.

I jump over an overgrown root and so does Esra in order to keep the pace.

"I thought so too, but I checked the map and it's been leading out close and closer to the edge of the floor," she says.

"I see…"

We are able to devise everyone else in the distance and notice that everyone has stopped in front of what looks like a wall. The surface is made out of smaller rocks and it seems to curve down as it extends on its height. Finally getting closer we notice what looks like an entrance to whatever lies beyond the wall.

"Where did it go?" I ask.

"The deer went inside, over there," Sinna says as she points to what seems to be the only entrance to this walled area of the grove.

"It could be a trap," Kayla says as she breathes in deeply to catch her breath.

"This doesn't feel like the kind of quest that would have something like that," Billfray comments.

"Alright then, let's go in," Elina says.

She approaches the entrance and disappears inside before anyone has any time to stop her.

"I'll go after her," I say, "You guys wait for Ruri."

"She is not with you?" Kayla asks.

"She got lost, I think," Esra says.

"Geez, fine, we'll wait here," Kayla huffs.

Feeling a bit sluggish I make my wait to the entrance, once I'm inside it's hard not to notice the fact that it seems to be brighter than outside. The walls on the inside are all lined up with glowing crystals of different sizes. Some are the size of my fist while others are just easily as big as me. It feels particularly humid inside the walled area, as I tread forwards I feel the ground getting mushy, probably because of the humidity itself.

"Elina," I call out, but there's no answer.

I keep making way through the soft ground and humid air when I come across what looks like a vine stretching itself from the branches of trees that tower above me. They look like beads of water, even more surprisingly the vine glows in a blue hue. As it's in my way I reach out to move it out of my path, once I touch it I hear a loud noise, that of a drop of water splashing against a surface. The light emanating from the vine flickers out and stops flowing completely at the touch of my hand.

"Huh…" I mumble.

I turn my head and in the middle of the darkness multiples vines begin shining, lighting a way to a small silhouette and an unmistakably white animal.

"Elina," I call yet again.

She seems lost in some kind trance as she stares off in some direction. I walk through the glowing vines pushing each single one out of the way, the sound of drops splashing sounding off as I touch each one. The deer notices me but it doesn't run away once I get closer, it simply turns its head in my direction and then looks away. Now that I'm close enough I'm able to see what Elina seems to be hypnotized by. Just a few feet ahead of us lies what looks like a small pedestal made out from marble and emeralds encrusted on multiple parts of it. Surrounding it is a shallow ring of water, the water is so still it practically works like a mirror as it easily reflects the glowing vines and crystals on the walls.

"This place is beautiful," she says as she walks towards the pedestal.

"Yeah," I utter.

Her feet splash gently as she crosses the ring of water and places herself in front of the pedestal. She places her hands on top of the thing and as if it were some kind of mirage half of the pedestal disappears. With half of the pedestal gone what is left is a tiara, made out of some white material. I would say ivory but I would need to inspect it further. Elina takes the Tiara into her hands and slowly places it above her head. She turns around and with a big smile laughs for a second.

"Does it look cute?" she asks.

"I…uh… sure," I answer.

She laughs some more and leaving the tiara on her head she approaches me. Once she is close to me the deer right next to me bows at her. This is some weird quest.

"Hey, thanks," Elina says softly.

"For what?" I asks.

"For this outing…I guess I really needed it," she says and breathes in deeply.

"Just think nothing of it, alright?"

"Ok then," she smiles, "Although…it's not bad to care about people Aereth."

"What do you mean?"

"You always try to make it look as if you don't care about anyone," she says but then chuckles, "You go to some crazy extents to make it look you really don't care…but…you do don't you? You care about everyone."

I nod at her, feeling a bit embarrassed.

"I just don't like poking into people's business…" I admit.

"I see," she says softly, "Either way…thank you."

"I found you!" someone bellows from behind.

I turn around just in time to see Ruri flying through the air, she flies perfectly in order to drop kick the deer out of the way. The poor animal whimpers in pain as it slams against a tree and disappears.

"What?! Why?!" Elina gasps, "Why did you do that?!"

"I thought we were supposed to catch it…?" Ruri ponders.

"Right, drop kicking a thing is the same as catching it," I huff.

"Hey, I thought…" Ruri mumbles and then looks through her menu, "Will you guys be ok with this whole deal if I told you I got really rare meat out of that?"

Elina chortles and starts all out laughing once Ruri takes a huge hunk of meat out of her inventory. I can't help but to start laughing as well. For the first time in a long while I find myself out of breath because of laughter. Elina's eyes are watering up because of the laughter as well and she reaches for her stomach as she is unable to stop. I feel glad in the end, although quite embarrassed as this girl happened to look right through me. I smile like a dumb idiot as I see Elina laughing and crying because of it. I hope in a way this turned out to be what she needed.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Wow, how long had it been since we had a relaxing chapter? I long while, I really freaking long while. This chapter might feel slow and short but it's just the kind of breather our lovely characters needed after all it all can't be pain and suffering. Well I mean it can and it will but sometimes I just have to be nice to them. I've been going through my early chapters as I said last time and I have to say they make me embarrassed, sadly I've only been able to update chapter 1 and 2. I've been working on all of them thought so take a peek once in a while you might notice they just flow better and stuff.

**Thisisawsome: **Thanks a lot for deeming my writing worthy of your whole day! **Electronic Ink 0: **Thanks for your constant reviews! Yeah apparently a few people also have the same trouble as you, makes me feel glad in a way because it means I did a really good job on the last chapter hehe. **SkySlash9: **The format I've adopted for this story I like to compare to a show you watch once a weel and if you feel that way I can only feel glad because I've achieved my goal! **IC0: **Glad to see you feel that way about what happened in the last chapter, a few other people sent me some colorful PMs regarding what I did. **Steve the Man: **Glad to see you are alive! Hang on tight we are ever closer to the end of my story! **davidholguin2: **CONGRATULATIONS you know have the 200th review achievement! Feel free to brag about it to everything cause, let's face it, it's like the coolest thing ever.Glad to see you were able to catch up, thanks on the happy wishes!

Wow so that's some record number of reviews, I can remember the last time I got a lot of them as well, it was when I did something very mean as well. Daath's death got me a lot of reviews and now Al being a complete shit gives me more. You guys just enjoy the drama, huh? Haha anyways that's all for this week, if you like what you read please leave a review or if you don't leave one as well saying how awful this is and what not. (I'm still surprised all of my freaking reviews have been positive.) Next week we are going back to a kind of chapter we haven't had in a while, I hope you look forward to it! See ya next week!

Next Chapter: "Call To Mind"


	63. Chapter 63 - Call to Mind

**Chapter 63: Call to Mind**

-From: Asuna  
-To: Alshep, Aeri  
-Subject: Regarding Laughing Coffin  
-Message: One of the members we took prisoner finally told us some very interesting information…we found them.

* * *

**November/4****th****/2022**

**Yuuji**

"I'm telling ya, you are too good of a person," my friend huffs, "I mean you might just insult him or whatever but you'll do that instead of fighting."

"Just, shut the hell up," I mutter as I splash my face with cold water.

For some reason my friend Masashi decided to come with me to the restroom in our brief lunch break. Albeit it has more to do with the problem I find myself in than anything else really.

"No can do friend," he says as he violently slaps my back, "I'll always have your back, well except when you get in fights or something."

It's extremely reassuring to know that my friend has my back at all times, except in fights, which just so happens to be the thing I will be walking into in a few short moments. I keep letting water go to waste; it overflows out of my hands as I try to make a little bowl. I sigh deeply and splash my face once again.

"So what happened exactly?" Masashi asks, "Why is Takumi so eager to beat your face in?"

"His girlfriend and I have to do a project together," I mumble and close the running faucet, "I've been spending a lot of time with her in her home. So naturally Takumi, being the dumbass that he is, thinks I'm up to something."

"Heh, can't blame him there! Cute precious Hinoka, her pretty always immaculate black hair, her eyes are gorgeous, she smells like flowers!" he says and slaps my back again as he takes a deep breath, "She is certainly one hot piece of a-"

I interrupt with a soft punch to the stomach.

"She is pretty," I huff and push him away, "She is not my type though."

He pushes me away as well and puffs his chest out in proud, trying to make it look as if my punch didn't take the air out of him.

"So what are you going to do then?" he asks, "The guy wants to meet you near the track at the end of the day, right?"

"I guess I'll meet him, try to explain myself," I sigh, "I could do without this bullshit, but I just want to get it out of the way."

We exit the restroom and slowly walking through the school's hallway I take time to soak in what probably are the last few minutes of peace I'll have for the rest of the day. I've never been a social butterfly; I doubt I'll ever will, dealing with people other than your friends is such a nuisance. I really wonder how I came by with such good friends to begin with. My circle is small, I can count my friends in one hand, but sadly the world is filled with other people, and other people tend to suck. I slide the door open to our classroom and head to my desk, in an all graceful fashion I slump on it and proceed to rest my head over it.

"Hey, move your face, I'm going to eat there," says a girl.

"Can't you eat over your table for once?" I complain.

I sit up and push both of my hands into my pockets. Another of my lovely friends, Ruri, sets her bento and thermos over my desk and turns her chair around to face me. She moves a bit of her short auburn hair out of her brow and opens her lunch to reveal some rice and vegies.

"Nah, if I did that I would leave crumbs or something over my desk," she says.

"How thoughtful of you," I huff.

"Well aren't you a sourpuss," she answers.

To think I once had a crush on this girl.

"Yuuji, move," says another voice from the side.

"Megumi, to what do I owe the pleasure?" I ask, "Part of me thought this would end when you were assigned to another classroom. Yet you are here, every day."

Another girl wearing the same school uniform as Ruri pulls a chair next to me and sets her food over my table. Megumi has more of a crappy diet so her lunch consists of curry bread and a pack of juice from the vending machine.

"Come on, you know you love me," Megumi says as she sticks her tongue out.

"I don't," I reply.

The screeching sound of yet another chair being dragged on the floor makes me tense up a little as I see Masashi taking the last available spot on my desk, to my left. Once again my desk has become a lunch table for my lovely friends. Not that I mind, I usually enjoy it, just not today.

"Yoh, you girls hear about the mess our dearest friend walked into?" he says.

"Oh, yeah," Megumi says with half of curry bread in her mouth, "You are going to fight Takumi, right?"

"I would rather not…" I groan.

"Huh?" Ruri gasps, "What did you even do?"

I bring my friends up to speed on the matter. It really isn't that hard to get your head around it anyways. Takumi is more or less the stereotypical bully of every school, he thinks way too highly of himself. The kind of guy that thinks everyone is talking about him and thus would get mad if someone happened to laugh and then accidently glance at him. On top of that I've just been purely blessed with luck and got assigned to do a project with his girlfriend.

Actually I tried to actively avoid even meeting her to work on the assignment. I went out of my way to create excuses, telling her could easily manage the whole thing via email. All of that in order to avoid any kind of excuse her boyfriend could come up with to bash my face in. Hinoka is not a bad person, she just happens to be oblivious to the fact that her boyfriend is a massive tool.

Sadly things went completely out of my control when one day she decided to come over to my apartment. That lead to more visits of her to work on the assignment, and then we ended up switching over to her house since it's just easier to work when there's more space to move around.

We arrive to this very day, a particular point in time where Takumi finally had enough of me going to his girlfriend's place and spending time with her. While I will admit that perhaps I have grown a bit close to Hinoka over the past few weeks our relationship does not tread out of the just friends territory. In the end, it all comes down to the fact that Takumi is the kind of guy to get jealous quite easily and does not enjoy the fact that I've been spending a lot of time with his dear lover.

"Wow, boys are dumb," Megumi sighs.

"You can't help it when that boy in particular is that dude Takumi," Ruri adds.

"Worry not ladies!" Masashi intrudes, "I'm sure our resident scholar and pacifist Yuuji will be able to solve it."

"I'm neither of those things…" I grunt, "I just want to go home man."

Megumi and Ruri keep eating their food while I just sulk, sinking deeper into both the anxiety and desperation of my current situation. If I avoid meeting Takumi all together the whole situation might just get worse. I tried telling Hinoka about it but she refuses to believe her boyfriend would do something like that.

"Changing topics to something other than Yuuji's impending doom," Megumi chuckles, "I hate you two so much!"

"What for now?" Masashi laughs.

"I wasn't able to get a pre-order for SAO!" she complains, "On top of that not only did Masashi get access to the beta and he didn't tell me, but now both of you got your pre-orders!"

"Dear Megu, please do not put your own lack of foresight as our fault," Masashi huffs, "You knew pre-orders were going to run out. Besides, maybe you can get one at one of those stores where they are gonna be selling to people without pre-orders."

"Ahhhh…." Megumi whines, "There are already lines for those…"

"That virtual reality stuff really gives me the creeps," Ruri comments.

"What?! It's like the coolest thing ever!" Masashi replies.

"Scratch that, the whole concept of online games just creeps me out," she continues.

"Huh, why?" I ask, getting curious.

She leans back on her chair a bit and keeps eating for a few seconds before answering me.

"Just think about it," she mumbles, "People you don't even know, all of them with fake names, pretending to be something they are not. That's just creepy."

"Huh…" I mutter, "People don't do that, do they Charles?"

I smile at myself, I truly think myself to be really funny.

"Haha, no way," Megumi laughs, "He is still using that username?"

"For practically everything," Masashi boasts proudly.

"Just proves my point…" Ruri mutters.

Masashi slaps the table and leans in close to Ruri who in response leans her body in a way to avoid being so close to him.

"It's all in the name of good fun," he says.

"No, it's just creepy," she says.

Before I realize I'm laughing and our break period is already over. I slug through the rest of the day just thinking about what I'm going to do once the bell dismisses us for the today. I pay no attention whatsoever in history and completely blank out from the very beginning of math. I spend my time staring out the window, watching the clouds go by, constantly sighing, thinking about how much better I would feel if I just went straight home.

However there is a particular scenario in my head where I do get in a fight with Takumi due to his hot headedness and win. It's like one of those times when you can't help but to day dream. Maybe if he throws a punch from the left I can duck and sock him in the face. Perhaps…I could grab his arm altogether stopping his fist from making contact all together with my body. That would look cool, but sadly I'm not a strong individual, nor am I nearly as nimble to probably dodge a punch.

"Hey."

I rest my head over my hand and sigh out once more. Maybe I could just go back home, Takumi might let it go, then again we aren't done with the assignment yet, so I would still need to meet up with Hinoka several times before I can stop being around her.

"Yuuji."

God dammit, why does shit like this happen to me? I just want to get back home, do whatever homework I may have quickly and just watch tv or something. Why is my life filled with crappy occurrences? It's just plain stupid, all of it.

"Yuuji!"

Ruri's yelling pulls me out of my thoughts and frantically looking around I notice the classroom is empty. It seems I spent more time than I should've worrying.

"Oh, sorry," I mumble.

"Geez…" Ruri huffs, "This whole thing just has you terribly worried, huh?"

"I just want to be left alone…" I whine, "Why is that such a hard thing to do?"

She puts both of her hands over my desk and turns to look at the door where my dearest of friends Takumi just so happens to be standing. The smug bastard shoots me a grin and then leaves. I guess there's no backing out now.

"What if you just, like escape?" Ruri says.

"That would hardly help out," I say and stand up.

I reach for my school bag and swing it over my shoulder. I push my free hand into my pocket and reluctantly walk to the door of the classroom.

"I can wait for you, if you want," she says.

"Nah, it's ok, just go home," I say, "See you tomorrow."

I exit the classroom and make a right; a few steps through the hallways put me next to a set of stairs which I go down almost slouching. I traverse the damn building and go out through the back door which points me in just the perfect direction to make a straight line to the track. I can see Takumi and some of his friends the same moment I exit the building. I start hoping that they are just there to watch and not to also beat my face in.

"I thought you were going to run away," Takumi yells as I get closer.

I say nothing, my eyes are dead set on the ground, watching myself place one foot in front of the other.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!"

I raise my head and realize that I'm already as close as I want get, that being just a few feet away from him.

"Well I didn't," I mutter.

I better keep my tongue on the low key; I would rather keep this situation from getting even more out of hand.

"I guess you got some things to explain," He says, "you can start by getting the hell away from my girlfriend."

What the hell? His sentence barely makes any sense. I roll my eyes and look around just to make sure there aren't more of Takumi's friends around just in case I want to make a run for it. I confirm that there aren't more people around and relax a little.

"We are just doing an assignment together," I say, "I really could not care at all about her in any other way than just a friend."

"So what?" he fumes, "Why the hell are you going to her house like two times a week, huh?"

"I already told you…"

I start getting very irritated, not only is the guy dumb but it appears he may also be deaf. I place my bag on the ground and cross my arms as he gets closer.

"Now listen," he says, "You better stop going to her house, or else I'll have to take measures on the matter."

For some odd reason and not even more than a few sentences into the matter I'm done with it all.

"No," I huff.

"What did you just say?"

"I said no, are you deaf?" I reply quickly, "I'm just going to her house to work on some stupid class assignment. I don't like your girlfriend, how can you be so fucking dense?"

"You better shut u-"

"No, you shut the hell up!" I growl and get a few steps closer to him, "I'm not going to stand here and take your shit just because you are some dumb asshole and can't get through that thick head of yours the fact tha-"

For some reason I'm lying down with back flat against the ground the ground. I blink a few times as I see a few clouds rolling in and raise my hand up to cheek which is pounding with an intense pain.

"Dear god…" I hear Ruri's voice, "Did you pass out? Geez are you alright?"

I see her standing above me and she is quick to kneel right next to me. I feel her hands reach for my shoulders and she somewhat forcefully tries to make me sit up.

"What happened?" I ask.

"Takumi knocked the lights out of you, it would seem," she says.

"Awesome…" I mumble.

"Do you feel diizy, woozy? Anything at all?" she asks.

I rub my cheek a little and prod around to find where the pain is strongest. I poke just below my cheekbone and feel a sharp pain just as I do.

"My face hurts," I admit.

"Yeah, that thing is gonna bruise a little," she says, "You'll be alright though."

"Yeah…hooray…" I spit and stand up slowly.

I rub my cheek and then reach for my bag that just so happens to be next to my feet. I swing it over my shoulder and clear my throat as I turn around. I help Ruri on her feet and we both walk alongside each other to the school's gate.

"I thought I told you to go home," I say.

"I wasn't going to leave you all alone," she says.

"Whatever then…" I huff.

We stop at the school's gate right next to the road. Ruri usually takes a left once she is out of the school and I take a right but for some reason we both stop and refrain from heading our respective ways.

"Yuuji," she says softly.

"Yeah?"

"You are nice guy, you know that right?" she says.

"Masashi said something similar…" I answer.

She smiles for a few seconds and then turns left.

"I hope life can be nicer to you in the future," she says, "You truly deserve it."

I have conflicted feelings as I hear those words come out of the girl who once rejected me in the past. I narrow my eyes as I see her walk away and once she is almost completely out of sight I turn around to head home.

"Well…even then I doubt life will smile on me all of the sudden," I mumble to myself.

* * *

-From: Alshep  
-To: Asuna, Aeri  
-Subject: Re: Regarding Laughing Coffin  
-Message: It could be a false lead or something. Are you absolutely sure about it? If so…where are they?

-From: Asuna  
-To: Alshep, Aeri  
-Subject: Re: Re: Regarding Laughing Coffin  
-Message: They have a hideout in floor sixty five, all the information we've gathered seems to point this out as their main hiding place, we could perhaps get them all in just once place. The clearers are getting a task force together to go after them. I thought it would be appropriate for you guys to know...maybe you want to take part in it.

* * *

**January/29****th****/2023**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Tolbana**

**Alshep**

"I'm starting to get cold feet…" I admit, trying to sound as quiet as possible.

"Come on man, you are doing great," Daath says, "We are doing great."

The man has a way with words, or more bluntly put he just knows the right thing to say at the right time.

"Thanks man," I say feeling better about my sorry ass.

Aeri is busy shoveling food into her mouth next to him and our brief moment of manly bonding is interrupted by loud munching. Not only is she not done with the food in her mouth but she makes the situation even more tasteless as she takes a big swig of the ale sitting right in front of her.

"What?" she asks with a small mouth.

"You remind me of a…" I mutter, "I want to say pig, but you know that would be sort of harsh."

"You wa-" she stops for a second and swallows, "You want to pick a fight his early in the morning?!"

"Do you?" I tease.

"Daath, tell him something!" she whines.

"Something," Daath says before laughing out loudly.

Aeri pouts and crosses her arms like a child and turns away from us. You can hear those sounds of her sounding off in a quiet manner. "Hmph" "tsk".

I chuckle a bit and rest my elbows over the table. It's kind of odd to see this inn so empty. Back in the day it was always so crowded, I guess in a way I feel nostalgic. The first few days of this guild thing have been quite alright, but I can't help but to feel a bit insecure about it. The new people make me feel a bit on edge, but they seem like nice people, then again I've never been much of a people person, that's more Eli's or Owl's job.

I feel my seat shift a little and notice Owl taking a seat right next to me. He holds a tray with a plate with some eggs and bacon and a big mug of something on the side.

"What is it with you people drinking this early in the morning?" Daath asks.

"I rather have some ale than water," Owl confesses, "It at least tastes like something."

He starts to chow down on his breakfast and I'm suddenly reminded of their outing in the dungeon a few weeks ago. Owl, Ruri, Regi, Kato and Yu went out to do some extra hard training some days ago. According to Yu and Owl everyone is more than capable of holding their own now; however Regi seems to be insecure of his abilities to fight.

"Hey, is Regi doing any better?" I ask.

"Oh, about that!" Owl says, "So much better, there's suddenly this fire in him. He is landing every strike and doing awesome switch attacks with everyone else, you should come along next time we go out."

"Heh, will do."

"So Owl," Daath starts, "Please back me up on this. Al is doing a great job as guild leader, right?"

"Huh?" Owl huffs, "Well yeah, who says he isn't?"

I feel embarrassed at how Daath just comes out with what I confided with him seconds ago. Part of me feels more at ease as Owl answers him, but at the same time I don't think it'll be a feeling I will be able to just so easily put to rest. Daath however will go out of his way to make me feel good about the decisions I'm making, he is just that kind of guy.

"Al says he is getting cold feet about the whole deal," Daath keeps exposing me.

"What?" Owl says in surprise, "Come on Al, you are doing a great job. We've got new members already, training is going great, and everyone's having a good time."

"See?" Daath says as he smiles at me.

"It's just a feeling that's been nagging me in the back of my head…" I admit.

While I sort of tell them what's been bothering I make sure not to go into detail. There's a whole list of things that bother me about suddenly having all these new responsibilities. I'm supposed to lead all these guys, but where? Where exactly am I supposed to lead them? The idea for the guild was to become some sort of help for low leveled players, but I never thought about how exactly I would do that. It just sounded good in my head I want to help people, I really do, but as of right now I don't have the slightest idea in how the hell am I supposed to do just that. Will training and leveling up suffice?

"I'm sure it will go away eventually," I say, "Maybe I just have to get used it?"

"Yeah, I'm sure you'll do great," Daath says, "Just try not to think a whole bunch about it, let it come naturally. You are a good guy man, you are doing just fine."

There's just so much to think about now, have to think of how we'll train the new members, how we will manage money. It has come to my attention that being a guild leader is more about management than anything else really. On top of that I've really wanted to get a place for our guild for some time now. Maybe buy a small house in a town somewhere, that way we'll have a place to call home, a place to go back to every night, a place that will become familiar. I would really love that.

"I…uh…Alshep?" A shy voice says behind me.

I turn around to notice one of our new group members and now guild member, Esra. Wearing yet another set of clothes I hadn't seen before and no armor whatsoever she shyly plays with her hair.

"Yeah?" I answer.

"Are you…are you still looking for a house to buy, for the guild?" she asks.

Convenient.

"Yeah, I've been looking around for place to buy, but they are all very expensive," I say.

"Well…I…I have an offer, if you are willing to hear me out," she says.

* * *

**July/20****th****/2024**

**Sixty Fifth Floor of Aincrad**

The wind is surprisingly calm today; it's usually in floors like this one, the ones with the vast fields of open space that have the most wind. Not today though, today everything is quite still and I'm starting to find it a bit weird. Not only does it feel awfully foreboding but the stillness of it all is just making me anxious.

I've decided to stray away from the "task force" set up by the clearers in order to clear my mind, I'm fired up, but at the same time I just feel an overwhelming feeling of uncertainty. This is finally it; we are putting an end to Laughing Coffin. Why do I feel like this then? I should be feeling happy and accomplished, but it feels like the exact opposite thing. I unsheathe my sword and drive it into the grass just in front of me; I'm sitting myself over a small boulder in the middle of the grassy field. If I try to strain hard enough I can somewhat make out the conversations of players not too far away from me.

"Are you…ok?" Aeri asks.

She managed to sneak on me, not surprising really; my straining or overall sense around me isn't that sharp.

"I actually wanted to ask you the same thing," I admit.

She stays silent for more than a few seconds, confirming my worries.

"Ever…ever since Asuna sent us that message…" she stammers, "The girl I see…has been acting up…"

"I see…" I mutter.

"You think you'll be able to keep it together?" I ask.

"I don't know…" she says softly, "but I really need to do this. This is the closure…I've been yearning for."

I nod and hear her walk around me, finally placing herself in front of me. She takes both of my hands into her own and tries her best to smile.

"Besides, if we are together…" she says, "I'm sure I'll be able to…maybe control it just a little bit."

"Hey guys, I want to introduce you to someone," Asuna's voice reaches me.

I stand up and turn around to see her walking our way. An eerily familiar black haired individual walking right by her side. Yeah I've seen that guy before; sadly our last meeting wasn't exactly a pleasant one.

"He is one of the best players I've ever met in the game," she says, "He's usually the lone wolf kind of guy but he insisted on helping out in this mess. You might have heard of him as the Black Swordsman but his name…"

"Kirito," I huff.

"Oh, you've met him before?" Asuna ponders.

"We have," Aeri spits, "Sadly he was a real asshole when we met him. Tell me Kirito, have you told our mutual friend about how you cut both of my arms off?"

"This is hardly the time to discuss that," Kirito says calmly.

"Wait, you did what?" Asuna asks sounding surprised.

"I will explain later, but if I'm not mistaken we are here to do something else," the beater says calmly.

"Whatever," I spit and turn around quickly to grab my sword.

I yank it off the ground, pulling some dirt and grass in the process. Wasting no further time I sheathe it and walk towards Asuna and the so called Black Swordsman.

"I'll have you know, I don't take kindly to that little stunt you pulled back in that inn, so you better pull you weight today," I huff as I stop next to Kirito, "So let's get going."

"Lead the way," he says with a wide smirk.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This update is quite late and I'm sorry about that, my doggy got injured and I've been focusing more time in taking care of her than revising this chapter for posting. Here we are though it is still Sunday so I've stuck to my deadline. Small victories people. So now, before any of you get your gets their panties in a twist let's start by clearing the fact up that the timeline in the wiki says the "crusade" against Laughing Coffin takes place in August but Reki Kawahara in one of his tweets states that it actually takes place somewhere in July. SO I'm sticking to the timeline and not exactly to the one in the wiki.

**Electronic Ink 0: **DO some of you forget to log in or something? I remember a user doing something similar, I just find it funny. Also no, sadly it is not magical just cute as hell.

Not a lot of reviews this week, is it because I teased you guys about just reviewing when extreme drama hits?! I'M SO SORRY. I'm not, I am absolutely sure my reviews spike when drama hits. Either way that's all for this week, if you like what you read please leave a review if you hate it, hell also leave a review. I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: Purge


	64. Chapter 64 - Purge

**Chapter 64: Purge**

**July/20****th****/2024**

**Sixty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Old Plains **

**Aeri**

"It's like fucking Christmas in July, I'm telling you!" Mirai laughs with delight, "Everything is just falling nicely into place, first the thing with Al, now this! Oh boy, aren't we having a blast, huh?"

I say nothing at all, Mirai has been so quiet and almost not even present for the last few months that hearing her be so rowdy is really making me annoyed. I really have been enjoying the silence and having her back in what seems to be like full force is really shaking my nerves. Adding the fact that I'm currently surrounded by players that I don't know and on top of that, they are staring at me funny because of my cursor. To say the least, nothing about the current situation is favorable.

"Aw," Mirai whines, "You are not talking to me right now? I mean there are a lot of people around, but whatever happened to your nasty little comments? Oh, I have an idea, let's go get our new boyfriend, you can talk to him about me all you want!"

I sit on the floor and hold my head, pressing my hands to my ears. I know it won't drown out her voice, but it's the least I can do at a time like this. I'm still able to hear everything else though, players getting their gear ready, maintaining their swords, the clinking of vials probably from potions or something similar. This task force is comprised of fifty high leveled players according to Asuna, all of them willing to take Laughing Coffin down; however, Thinker decided to stay behind and has been bossing everyone around.

"Ok, everyone listen up!" Thinker yells.

I tilt my head slightly but decide to keep my current position. Every other player towers above me as they are standing up. I stay on the ground, almost sulking, until I notice a familiar pair of boots.

"What are you doing on the ground?" Al asks.

I look up, trying my best to make it so my face doesn't scream anxiety or anything of the like. He offers his hand and I reach out for him. With his help I stand up and take a look in Thinker's direction, he is standing on top of some boxes not too far from us. Asuna takes her place right next to me and just glancing in her direction I'm able to see Kirito, calmly standing next to her.

"You know…" Mirai whispers, "I bet no one would bat an eye if that guy were to have an accident during this little event of yours."

I press my teeth against each other and roll my eyes at her remark. I'm not exactly number one in the Kirito fan club, but I don't exactly want to kill him either. I try to discard the whole thing as Mirai just being back in full gear, but it's somehow hard to do so as she is constantly pestering me; she probably making up for all that time she remained quiet.

"We are about to go against what is probably the most dangerous group of people in all of Aincrad," Thinkers states, "Given the current scenario we are encountered with a very important question, that being if we rather keep our humanity or pull ourselves down to the level of these killers."

"Ahahaha!" Mirai laughs, "Man, who brought this guy along?"

Thinker is wrong though, the question is whether you would rather kill or be killed. Members of Laughing Coffin will not hesitate to kill us. Why should we? It's just a stupid and unnecessary risk to try and take them alive. Sadly I'm not in a position where I can voice my opinion and even if I did it would just be discarded due to my cursor.

"I appreciate the words of the leader of the Aincrad Liberation Force," A deep voice speaks, "However; you were not chosen to lead this task force."

A man with short black hair makes a small jump to stand atop the boxes Thinker himself is standing on. He sports a full suit of armor along with a massive tear drop shield in one hand and a spear on the other. There's a strong air to him, his expression is serious, the kind of person you would expect to rise up to the cause. The fact that his sideburns are a bit long just adds to his manly and authoritative persona.

"My name is Mason," he states firmly, "I'm the leader of this task force and as leader I expect you to completely disregard Thinker's words."

"What are you doing?" Thinker complains.

"I should be asking you the same," Mason huffs, "Listen up! Members of Laughing Coffin will not hesitate to kill you! I only expect you to do the same. Now please Thinker, unless you plan on participating, I suggest you head back home."

"Now this guy is making more sense," Mirai mutters.

"You ok?" Al asks.

"Yeah, yeah….yeah," I reply.

"Too many yeahs," Mirai teases.

Al gives me a concerned look and then softly places his hand on my shoulder. I find some sweet relief in his touch, my hand rises and places itself over his own and for a few seconds I'm able to rest a bit easier.

"According to our current information," Mason continues, "The guild known as Laughing Coffin is currently hiding at the very end of a dungeon like structure, just under the Old Castle."

Asuna already gave me this information; as a matter of fact I already scouted out the place one day ago. I didn't go far into the dungeon as to not attract any unwanted attention, but I was able to see a few members come and go. The information supplied by the clearers is spot on, but we don't have any information regarding their levels or numbers. In a way we are going into this mess partially blind, yet no one seems to care.

"We'll divide ourselves into two groups," Mason says, "High levels will lead the group, while lower ones stay in the back, providing back up."

"Great," Mirai titters, "We'll probably get a front line to the bloodbath, love it!"

"Shut up already…" I mumble.

"You say something?" Asuna asks.

My hair stands on edge and I cough nervously as I try to make up a coherent sentence.

"Ah, uh, no, no not at all," I chuckle.

Asuna's gaze lingers on me for a few seconds. She even leads her hand to her chin and keeps staring as she appears thoughtful.

"You are nervous, aren't you?" she says.

"Well somebody give Sherlock Holmes here a fucking medal," Mirai huffs.

Mason keeps talking, laying out the formations and how he recommends we split up once we find members of Laughing Coffin. There's also the chatter of different players all around me and top of that Asuna now has fixated herself on my person.

"It's been a while since you had this much fun, huh?" Mirai says, "Your head starting to hurt? Do you feel annoyed?"

Of course, this is totally great and it doesn't feel annoying at all. Mirai bends over and laughs as she paces around me. I was so happy seeing her in her low energy state, it was pleasant, she wasn't loud or annoying. There were days where I didn't even see her.

"Alright!" Mason yells, "We leave in half an hour!"

The crowd disperses into various tiny groups, maybe they know each other or maybe they are just making parties in order to get ready. I look around, doing my best to get Mirai out of my sight but she seems to be standing wherever I look with a grinning face. Al grabs my shoulder and turns me around to face Asuna and Kirito.

"We should make a party," Asuna suggests, "the four of us should be unstoppable."

"If I'm not wrong, we should be the top players in this entire group," Kirito comments.

"Huh, what makes you so sure?" I ask.

"I read Asuna's reports prior to this," he says, "Not only are you both capable, but you are also above some of the top players on the clearing guilds."

"Well, being head of the recon battles really asks a lot of you," Al says smugly.

Kirito sighs and scratches his head as he looks at Al, there's some obvious electricity flowing in the air and it's seems to be that Al and Kirito are about to jump each other. Asuna slowly inches her way to me and chuckles for a brief moment.

"Boys, huh?" Asuna whispers close to me.

"Uh…yeah…sure," I reply.

The uncomfortable silence generated from Al and Kirito having what I can only describe as a stare down lasts more than a few minutes. Asuna finally steps in and takes Kirito away for a few seconds, perhaps to chat or something. I'm left alone with Al, without noticing I've made my way to the ground and I'm once again sitting.

"You want something to eat?" Al asks, "Esra made us a few things before we left."

"Did she make any sandwiches?" I ask.

"Yeah, give me a second," he says as he sits next to me.

He drags his menu down and takes out a wrapped sandwich from his inventory, he passes me my food and I grab it with both hands, still not breaking eye contact with Mirai.

Right in front of me I can see Mirai, she is crouching about a foot or so away from me. She is smiling from ear to ear as she stares at me right in the eye. I feel my eye twitching a little, I try to stop myself but it seems to be something completely involuntary. I shake my head quickly and start unwrapping my food.

"So…uh," I mumble, "How are things with El-"

"Are you seriously going to ask that?" he cuts me off.

"I just thought… maybe…" I stumble with my words.

"She doesn't want to talk to me at all, anymore," he says, "The last thing she told me was the she found out. Both you and I can figure out quite simply what the means."

I take a bite out of my sandwich and try to once again distract myself, this time by taking in the flavor of my food. As expected from Esra, it's delicious; I can feel the tender chicken almost dissolve in my mouth and the subtle saltiness of both the lettuce and tomato. The chatter from other players once again overpowers our own and somehow it manages to be more uncomfortable and awkward than silence.

"Are…are you mad at me?" I ask, fearing the answer.

Al sighs deeply and then turns his head to look at me.

"I'm not, there's no way I could be…" he says.

"Then he is mad at himself, he thinks you are a mistake," Mirai smiles.

"Are you…mad at yourself?" I ask.

"A bit…" he admits, "Elina doesn't deserve what I did to her…"

I feel a sudden weight over me as I strangle the poor sandwich in my hands. Of course he does, I'm just another instance in his now long line of mistakes. It's funny in a way, after all, everything I've done in the past few years have all been fuck ups. One after the other without stopping.

"But…" he adds.

I immediately turn my head to him and swallow my own spit as I wait for him to continue his sentence.

"In way, I don't regret it," he says with a bit of a melancholic tone, "I'm not exactly proud…but I don't regret it. Wow, don't I sound like absolute shit?"

"You do tend to gravitate towards crappy things," Mirai pokes.

He finishes his statement with a wry smile but it makes me feel so damn happy. I continue eating my food, filling warm inside, with a smile I try to cover up by shoving the sandwich into my mouth.

"I wonder if he is just saying that to make you feel better about yourself…" Mirai says.

I ignore and keep conversing with Al. We talk about anything really. He tells me he is very nervous about this whole situation. In a way he thinks it will finally end any worries we might have about Klaus or Laughing Coffin in general, but he just can't help it to be nervous. To an extent I feel the same, maybe this will be the day, maybe this will be the day that I lay it all down to rest. Perhaps after today I can go back to living without worries. Maybe, just maybe after this day I'll be able to have some peace. Sadly uncertainty is playing a huge role here and it's making me full of worry.

I can't even tell anymore for how long I've been holding on to this grudge. A year? Two years? It's hard to tell, time is weird in Aincrad, push in the fact that you don't have to eat or sleep at all and you surely can understand how it's hard to keep track of anything time related. At least for me it is.

"So, when do we get to kill more people again?" Mirai asks, "It's been way. Too. Long."

"Alright, gather your things!" Mason yells, "We are heading out!"

"Let's get going!" Mirai laughs, trailing off to incomprehensible babble.

Al stands up and sets his hand over the pommel of his sword; he breathes in deeply and takes a step forward. Asuna and Kirito join us with equally as confident airs. Before me appears a party invite sent by Kirito himself. I raise my hand and press the circle in order to accept the invite. Their names appear below my own and seconds later Al's name also appears under my own health bar.

"Let's do this!" Mirai says with excitement.

* * *

**Sixty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – Old Passage Way**

This dungeon's layout is no easy thing; there are multiple floating platforms from where it's easy to fall to an even easier death. So, as it would only make sense, progressing with a group of fifty people has been hard. Part of me thinks this whole section of the game was just done in order to make traversing cumbersome. Some platforms are just too small for more than once person, there's really no way this was done in any other way than to just present a challenging jumping puzzle. Mason jumps over to the next platform; following him I jump over to a big rectangular platform and hear everyone else land behind me. He walks all the way to the other end of the platform and then leisure turns around to make sure the rest of the group is alright. Kirito and Asuna walk past me and head to the front as I wait for Al to be by my side. Player after player walks past me until finally Al is standing right next to me.

"We are close to what Laughing Coffin is calling their headquarters!" Mason announces, "I'll say this once again, just like I said back in the fields!"

"Alright…I guess there's going to be a big speech…" Al sighs.

"These are red players, once the battle starts not one of the will hesitate to attack you!" he says, "We cannot allow ourselves to think any other way, otherwise we will be killed, however, I believe our primary group to have levels way above that of their own. So if we are lucky, they might even surrender without a fight!"

The group starts laughing in unison, propagating a sense of superiority and security. If I've learned one thing while trapped in this game is that you can't allow yourself to feel safe, not for a moment. Not even a second later a hooded figure lands besides me and in the corner of my eye I can see a wide grin coming from under the hood. I feel myself smiling, but I bet my grin at the moment looks a bit more disturbing.

"Where is your sword, pretty girl?" it asks with ghoulish tone as it swings at me with a shiny blade.

"SHOW HIM WE DON'T NEED ONE!" Mirai yells.

Within the heartbeat I equip Cain and Able and stop my attacker's blade with one hand. I pull back my right hand and with a smile I let the system connect my fist to the hooded figure's stomach. More than half of my right arm easily slide in through the man and I let go of the man's blade in order to claw at his face. I chuckle for a brief second and watch as the poor bastard shatters into tiny bits of data. The sound of metal clashing against metal grows unbelievable loud all of the sudden. As I look around I can see multiple players, all covered in hoods attacking our group. This is an ambush; they were waiting for us to get here.

"Aeri!" Al screams.

I turn my head quickly and see Al struggling with two men. He parries them with amazing speed but if I don't intervene, things are sure to take a bad turn. I dash towards Al and jump in just in time to brush a blade heading for him to the side.

"What the hell!" the hooded figure yells.

I reach for its neck and seize it with my left hand. I tighten my grip and hear the person choke under my hand. With my free hand I tear the hood off and reveal a yellow haired girl.

"It's not her!" Mirai says.

I slam the girl on the ground and drive my right hand through her stomach. Sadly, this does not kill her. She complains and screams as I make sure to cause as much damage as I'm able to.

"Where's PoH?!" I ask.

The girl can only scream in incoherent words as I get closer and closer to killing her. The girl decides not to speak all the way to the point where her health points reach zero. She disappears and I stand up to look around. The rectangular platform has become a blood bath. Players from Laughing Coffin keep jumping into the platform and attack players from our group as we do our very best to defend ourselves. I defend myself appropriately, attacking when it's safe to do so, but mostly I'm just defending myself as I look around for some very particular individuals. Mirai laughs constantly, she seems out of breath but yet she keeps laughing as I defend myself and attack. Where are they?! In between keeping myself from getting hurt and attack I desperately look around for any signs of Xaxa, Johnny, Klaus or PoH. I turn around just in time to stop a blade from an attacker, to my surprise it's not a member of Laughing Coffin but a players from our group.

"I'm sorry, I thought you were one of them!" he says.

I refuse him any words coming from me and toss him to the side. As I throw him out of the picture I'm able to see a familiar masked individual standing on a distant platform. Xaxa stares at the battle from a distance and I can't help it but to smile once I have my gaze fixated on him.

"Al!" I yell, "Follow me!"

I turn just for a brief second to see him nod and start running through the crowd. Sooner than expected I find myself on the edge of the platform and jump towards the next, which is a few feet up. Once I land on the platform and look at Xaxa once again I'm able to see him smile through the slight opening on his mask. Al lands next to me seconds later and I jump to the next platform, pushing myself to get closer and closer to the skull-faced player.

"Get him!" Mirai orders.

I jump once again, this time to Xaxa's platform but fail to notice another figure that quickly grabs my ankle and slams me against the ground.

"So you finally caught up," the figure says with a soft laugh under his breath, "I have to say I expected to see you sooner, I also half expected to see you on our side as well!"

I roll to the side and once I stand up I'm able to see that it's no other that Johnny. He plays with a dagger on his right hand as he gets closer. Al crashes against him as he lands on the platform and kicks him away from me. Johnny grunts and groans as he rolls back on his feet and then laughs. Still laughing like a maniac he clutches at the bag that covers his face and starts breathing in heavily like some kind of pervert.

"And she brought a friend!"

"Put your weapons down!" Al yells.

"As if!" Xaxa says and dashes in to attack Al.

Johnny moves erratically to the right and starts closing in on me. With the bag over his head I'm unable to see anything other than his eyes, but his eyes alone are everything I need to see in order to realize his is out to kill me.

He swings at me with his dagger and I'm able to dodge it with a quick step backwards. He laughs after missing me and continues to slash at me with no contact whatsoever.

"You are fast!" he laughs, "Tell me, where's that dagger I gave you?!"

I chuckle and get a hold of his armed hand. I take the chance to pull him in close, close enough for our noses to touch. I feel the fabric of the bag over his head rubbing against my nose and chuckle a bit louder.

"I sold it," I say with a grin.

"You what?!" he screams as he head-butts me.

I shake my head to discard the feeling and keep laughing for a bit. He takes a few steps back and readjusts his grip on his weapon.

"Hey, I got a few thousand col out of that shitty thing, you can't blame me, now can you?" I tease.

"Only a few thousand?!" he bellows and dashes in for another attack.

I take a hold of his dagger and then punch his arm, making him let go of his weapon. I throw the dagger behind him and punch him across the face a few times. I'm able to connect a few hooks before he backs away. At the same time, Al kicks Xaxa away from him and takes a step closer to me. Irritated, Johnny looks through his menu in a desperate manner and equips a short sword.

"So who are these guys anyways?" Al asks.

"Some idiots we are about to kill," I reply, "They might now where Klaus is though."

"That's all I needed to hear," Al says and readies a skill on his sword.

"It really goes beyond my reasoning why PoH didn't kill you any sooner," Xaxa says, "Even now, he expected you to join us."

Really? Even now? Maybe the first time he proposed the idea I did think about it, but in the end PoH is just some deranged person I would rather keep away from. His logic makes no sense; after all he is just my gateway to that bastard Klaus.

"The big boss is down there killing your friends," says Johnny, "So, what we do with you right now is completely up to our jurisdiction!"

Both Xaxa and Johnny lunge at us, just by how they do so you can see they haven't thought up of any tactic in order to work together. Thankfully Al and I have fought together so many times that we have more than a few tricks up our sleeves. Xaxa's sword clashes against Al's and he manages to fend him away with a stronger blow. I simple brush Johnny's sword to the side and look at Al just in time to see him nod.

"Switch!" we scream in unison.

The game allows me to slide effortlessly under Al as he jumps over me in order to switch sides. I punch Xaxa's right leg and make him fall flat on his back as Al easily stabs his sword cleanly through Johnny. He retrieves his sword and pulling it back a little it starts shining brightly with a skill.

"Downfall!" Al bellows.

He strikes Johnny with a powerful strike shattering whatever piece of armor the poor bastard has on him. I stand and jump over Xaxa. I pin him down by placing my foot over his armed hand and the other right on his neck.

"Kill them!" Mirai says, "You got them both! Kill them!"

Al stabs his sword through Johnny's foot and pins him on the spot. Using his unarmed skill he punches him on the chest a few times and finishes with a right hook to the face, successfully knocking him down on his ass. Al takes a deep breath and presses his foot on Johnny's chest.

"What now?" he asks.

"We ki-"

"Aeri!" Asuna yells.

I look behind me and see her land along with Kirito on the edge of the platform.

"We managed to subdue the rest of Laughing Coffin," she says, "They gave up!"

"Huh? Just like that?" Al asks.

"We killed a few of them…" says Kirito, "I actually took down two of them…but it's true! They are surrendering!"

"Dammit! Just kill them anyways!" Mirai says, "They are not going to take this away from us."

More players arrive behind Kirito and Asuna and without even taking a moment to think about it they seize Xaxa and Johnny from our grasp.

"We'll send them to the black castle," Asuna says with a smile, "We did it, Aeri!"

"Wait!" I say, "Did anyone get the leader?"

"There was so much confusion in battle, if he is not already under custody, you can rest easy that he is…dead," Kirito says, finishing his sentence with a bit of sorrow.

"We have the rest of the group moving on to their headquarters, no one is getting away!" Asuna says.

Al sheathes his weapon and runs over to me, he grabs my shoulder and pulls me close.

"We finally did it!" he says.

"Did we now?" Mirai says bitterly.

"It's over, it's finally over!" he says.

Mirai once again grows silent and appears before me with a tired look, as if any will within her had just been taken away from her. It makes me happy, seeing Mirai like that is probably the best feeling I could experience. Not to mention that Laughing Coffin is finally done for. Right? I feel a hollow caving in my stomach but even then I feel so happy. It's finally over.

My damn nightmare, I can finally lay it down to rest.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I HAVE AWESOME NEWS! DragonofAnnoth is coming back to beta-read my awful writing! (BUT I didn't send him this chapter with enough time, so I'll add his revisions when he gets back to me. I suck.)

Anyways, I know that was kind of anti-climactic, but guess what? This isn't the climax of my story. Also the word "Purge" means as Lord Google tells me "rid (someone) of an unwanted feeling, memory, or condition, typically giving a sense of cathartic release", SO this chapter if it leaves you feeling weird and stuff due to how it plays out, I've achieved my goal. Fun times ahead you'll see. But by all means comment on this chapter if you so desire to, I know it's not one of my best.

**Electronic Ink 0:** It makes me glad that you identify with him, one of my teachers told me that it's when the reader sees himself in your characters that you know you are doing a good job! **IC0: **If I'm allowed to be honest I'm so proud of the last chapter, it just seemed fitting to close up the flashback chapters with Al. I felt all kinds of emotion when writing it. ; - ; **tehg2000:** Thank you so much! Glad you like my story!

Well that's that for today, as always if you like or don't like what you read please leave a review! I'll see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Manumission"


	65. Chapter 65 - Manumission

**Chapter 65: Manumission**

**August/3****rd****/2024**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – City of Barrowdell**

**Aeri**

"So…uh, you are really going to talk to her?" I ask.

"Well, I'm going to try," Al answers.

"I'm sure it'll be alright, she's a kind hearted girl," I mumble, "You'll be ok, Al."

Barrowdell's architecture allows for a lot of alleyways, and we just happen to be standing in one. Noisy steps from multiple NPCs and players echo kind of loudly in-between the narrow walls, it's somewhat distracting. Al has arranged for Elina to meet him in a small restaurant in the heart of the city. Given how I really don't have anyone else to hang around with I've sort of come along with him. However, he says he really needs to meet her alone, and that if I were to be seen his whole idea would probably backfire.

I understand, I truly do, but at the same time it makes me feel a bit unwanted… which I am, but still.

"Christ…," he sighs, "I don't even know what I'm going to say to her…I'm such a shitty person."

His words also manage to hurt me in a way. When someone cheats there's not only one party which has done wrong, both parties are in the wrong. The one that cheats and the person he or she cheats with are both in a morally wrong area. In the end it weighs down to who feels the most guilt. In this particular scenario Al is drowning in guilt, whereas I'm having a hard time feeling guilty at all. Even after he said he doesn't regret it, it's more than obvious that he does. I hunch over a little, crossing one arm over and gripping the other, sighing. It was probably a bit too loudly. Al takes notice and he stares at me for a brief second. He opens his mouth just slightly, as if he is about to say something, but he stops.

"Why are you torturing yourself like this?" Mirai asks, sounding almost worried.

"I think, I'll get going," Al says, "I'll see you later alright?"

"Yeah," I answer.

He leaves the narrow alleyway and I lean against the wall. The thought of stopping him crosses my mind for a few second but I refrain from doing so. I refrain from doing what I would really want to do. Mirai is standing right in front of me, looking gloomy. She crosses her arms and looks away further into the alley.

"I don't want them…to get back together," I admit.

"Is this really the best of times to be talking to yourself?" she says.

"I just…" I sigh, "Don't want to be alone…not again."

She laughs softly; the confined space we stand in feels a bit more cramped than it should, with her right in front of me.

"I thought you were used to it," she says, "Tell me, what happened to that girl who could be by herself? The one that would rather be alone, the one that didn't need anyone else as some kind of pathetic support, where is she?"

"I don't know…" I answer.

I rest my back flat against the wall and slowly slide down until I'm sitting down on the floor. It feels nice and cool and I almost relax, almost let my guard down.

"You know what?" she says, "I'm tired."

Mirai has gone back to her beat down state, it really I something I love. She doesn't talk much nor do I see her as often. It's a nice break in a way, and so far I've been able to figure a few things out. I really do wonder if being conscious about being sort of crazy improves your mental state or the other way around. It's a thought that has been going around my head for the longest time now. Mirai is out for something in particular, something that I've been missing for a long a while. She wants to get back at Klaus and Laughing Coffin for what they did. Even I can figure out that means I want the same, now with Klaus and that guild out of the picture there is no more drive left in Mirai, or me for that matter.

Going insane is so different compared to how you would see it in movies though. She is this blurry vision of myself which I just can't stand. Movies paint it to be so clear, so freakishly clear to the point it's indistinguishable from real life. For me though it's so amazingly jarring that at the first glance I got of her I knew something was wrong. I spread my palms over the floor and breathe in slowly. This whole situation is just another splinter under my nails. I don't want to lose Al, I don't want to be all alone again. It would tear me up. It would finish the job started so long ago now...

"I know it's crappy of me to think like this…but I just…" I stop to take a deep breath, "I want to at least have one person that doesn't entirely hate me."

A while passes and get no answer from Mirai, I scan around the alley, for the first time in my life seeking her out for an answer. There's no sign of her, I look around frantically but I simply cannot spot her. I stand up and pace around as I start feeling anxious.

"Mirai…?" I call out.

Once again, there no answer, I'm just standing in an alleyway that seems to be getting narrower by the second. Where is she? Where is she? I need an answer; I need to hear it from her…from me? I close my eyes and harshly rub them my hands.

"Where are you?!" I howl, "Mirai?!"

I walk out of the alleyway into the massive crowd of players and NPCs moving about. My anxiety only grows larger and I feel the need to just drop on the ground and curl into a ball. Why is it always the timing that is complete and utter shit? Why is it always the timing? Nothing ever happens at the time I need it to happen and shit seems to happen all the time I don't need it to happen.

I try to walk but trip over my own feet amongst the crowd. I need to get to Yuuji, I need him right now. I bump my head around with a few NPCs, there's a part of me that hopes to hear Mirai's voice any second now, but it's just not happening. Just speak up already, laugh at me or something, just do it…please. I think hard about Mirai, I try my hardest but it seems I'm doing so in vain. She is not before my eyes, I cannot hear her voice, she is…gone.

Against my better judgment I start walking to the restaurant Al said he would meet Eli. Showing up will screw things over, but really how much worse can any of this get? I'm already short on friends, shorter on people who trust me.

I practically slam my body against the wall of the restaurant and sluggishly take a few more steps, trying to get closer to the small window that is facing the street. Finally being able to peek inside I see a picture that doesn't sit well with me. Eli is holding Al close to herself, hugging him. I don't know if I'm feeling jealous or angry, perhaps a bit of both.

"Well look at that," Mirai huffs, "I wonder if they made up or something."

"Where were you?" I ask.

"Nevermind that, you should be worrying about that picture over there," she says as she points at Al and Eli.

"Shut up, there's no way they made up," I say.

Eli stops hugging Al and slides her hands down to his own. She holds them gently and with teary eyes speaks something I'm unable to hear. I press my head against the window and try my best to strain through the glass but I'm unable to hear a thing. Eli continues touching Al, placing her hand on his cheek, mouthing word after word as she maintains constant eye contact with him. They are way too close…too close. I slam my fist against the wall and immediately go into hiding.

It's not fair, it wouldn't be fair. I need him, he's mine. Eli shouldn't forgive him, what he did was wrong and he…he should be punished, they can't get back together, they just can't. I peek in again and see that they are still having a heart to heart. They are staring into each other's eyes, just like used to do before. It can't happen, I won't allow it.

I head for the door, as I'm about to place my hand on it something stops me. Aereth is holding my arm, tightening his grip by the second.

"What are you doing?" he asks.

"What are YOU doing?!" I snap as I try to get him to unhand me.

"Elina asked us to come along with her," Aereth says, "She didn't want to come out here all alone."

"Us?" I stress.

From behind Aereth steps out Sinna with a nasty frown. She eyeballs me and then breathes out through her nose. I get both bewildered and hurt by her look. I really do not have my emotions on check today.

"Hi," she says under her breath.

"You aren't going to interrupt them, are you?" Aereth says.

"I…I…I…" I stammer as I look around nervously, "I was going to…"

Aereth sighs and Sinna all out refuses to look at me as she stares off in the distance.

"Let's just go to the shop next door," Aereth says.

I want to just open the door and go over to Al, but I feel like Aereth is dragging me behind him even though he no longer has a hold on me. I walk in behind him inside the building just next door to the one Al is in. It's a small café kind of place. It has a single NPC wandering around, cleaning the empty tables of the place. Shortly after, Sinna comes inside and quickly makes her way to Aereth, going around a table or two in order to not get close to me.

I hear Mirai yawn loudly close to my ear. She walks slowly in front of me and stretches her arms upward.

"Aren't you sleepy?" she asks.

I shake my head in a subtle way and watch her slowly disappear before my eyes. Aereth beckons me over as he chooses a small table in the far back of the establishment. He takes a seat and Sinna joins him after a moment's hesitation. Reaching them, I take a seat myself and try to clear my thoughts. The current situation isn't the most comfortable one I've been in.

"So…" I mutter, "How are you guys…doing?"

"I'm doing alright," Aereth says as he hails the NPC, "I barely even see you anymore, what's up with that?"

Sinna crosses her arms and yet again stares off in another direction. Aereth turns his head slightly to her and places his hand over her shoulder.

"Are you going to answer her?" he asks.

"I don't want to…" Sinna mumbles.

"Don't be like that…" Aereth says.

For some reason I thought I would be over Sinna's rejection towards me, I tried to convince myself that maybe I could easily move on from that, but to this day I'm unable to. I miss her so much. I miss the way she used to smile at me, I miss the way she would seek me out to help her with anything in her mind. Seeing her act this way towards me hits me like a brick. I wish I could say the right thing to make her forgive me, but I doubt those words even exist. Even if they did I've long lost my window of opportunity to apologize.

Sinna looks at me for a bit, but it seems my image alone disgusts her. She places her hands over the table and breathes in deeply.

"I'm ok…" she says.

The NPC finally arrives out our table and Aereth orders some coffee for himself, taking a quick look at Sinna he chuckles and orders a hot chocolate. He offers to get something for me as well but I refuse.

"So…what were you going to do just now?" Aereth asks.

To come clean on the matter would just taint my image further in Sinna's eyes and while Aereth would probably not pay much attention to it I'm sure he would at least judge me silently on the matter. To say that I wanted to go inside and stop Al from apologizing, to tell Elina that he said that he doesn't regret what he did. To say all that just wouldn't work in my favor. I can't lie either though; I feel like Aereth could just easily see through my lie.

"I wanted to stop Al," I say as I look down on the table.

"Why?" he asks.

I feel my chest tighten and for a brief second have trouble breathing in. I clench my palms into fists and feel my eyes water a bit.

"I don't want to be alone…" I sniffle.

I expect Aereth to tell me some words with a deep meaning in order to try and cheer me up. He is the kind of guy who would do that, I think. The kind of guy that who would tell me something like, "You don't have to be" or "You are not alone".

"Well, if you keep acting this way, you are going to be," he says.

I blink once in shock.

"What are you talking about?" I ask softly, "I know I fucked up…but what am I supposed to do if no one will even look at me? Are you really telling me to let go of the one person who doesn't look at me like I'm a piece of filth?"

"No, I'm telling you to let Alshep do whatever he wants to do," he says, "Whether he makes up with Elina or not is not up to you."

"But…but…" I say.

I refuse the idea, I need Al…I need Yuuji, I need him.

"You don't understand…" I plead, "I…I can't it let it happen…"

"Why?" Sinna asks.

"Because I…because…" I struggle to come up with a reason.

It wouldn't make any sense for them; they don't know the whole story. I bet if they did they wouldn't even be sitting so close to me right now. If they knew about Mirai, if they truly knew of all I've done. They would hate me more than they already do. I'm sure of it.

"Because I need someone…" I admit, "I need someone to be by my side."

"So that's why you are stealing Eli's boyfriend?" Sinna asks.

"Sinna!" Aereth says in surprise.

"Sorry…" she mumbles, but it is clear she is not.

She meant that, she really did. It's not like she is wrong. I knew what I was doing, I knew what I wanted and I got it. It might've been just one night, it might've been wrong but it all comes down to the fact that at least that day I wasn't alone, that day I wasn't completely hated. I see the fault in my logic, I understand how wrong it was, but at the time I didn't care, and I hardly care right now. If it weren't because of these two I would've already broken up Al's and Eli's conversation.

"Why do you hate me so much, Sinna?" I mutter, "Ever since you stopped talking to me, I've tried my best, I really have…why do you still hate me?"

"Because you are bad person," she says and stands up, "I'm going back home."

She walks past me on her way out and I reach out for her hand. I grab it tightly and fall of my chair, kneeling on the floor. I squeeze her soft little hand and force her to look at me.

"Just tell me what to do, please…" I cry, "What do I need to do for you to forgive me?"

"Can you get Regi back?" she asks with a serious tone.

"I can't…"

"How about sis?" she continues.

"I can't."

"Sinna, stop," Aereth says.

"How about Siren? Can you get her back?" she asks, sounding angry.

"I can't!" I bellow.

She shakes me off violently, rubbing her arm and glaring daggers at me.

"Then I'm sorry, you can't do anything for me to forgive you," she seethes.

She storms out of the building and slams the door on her way out. I'm still kneeling on the floor, absorbed by the misery. Tears are racing down my cheeks, but at least I've got my breathing under control. At the very least if I'm gonna cry I will avoid looking like a desperate baby. I hear the NPC behind me announcing that she's brought the drinks over. The automated person asks Aereth if he would like anything else, to which Aereth says no. I hear him push his chair as he stands up and seconds later a feel a warm sensation on my back. He pats me gently, like some sort of street dog.

"She's… just having a hard time dealing with it all," he says, "Just…give it time, she is just kid, she'll open up eventually..."

"Yeah, I keep forgetting she is the only one having a hard time here…" I say and try to force a chuckle that ends up as a pained groan, "What can I even do, Aereth? You say that if I keep acting like this I'll end up alone, but what can I do? Eli hates me, Sinna hates me, Kayla and Ruri avoid me like the plague…."

"I don't hate you," he says, "I'm pretty sure Billfray feels the same way, although you two barely even talk to begin with…"

"That's not really any advice…" I say.

"Just, how about you start with not leaving the house every two seconds, or you know you could actually try and talk to Kayla or Ruri," he says, "Hell you even stopped talking to Esra and she was helping you with all that mess before."

"So, I should just ease my way in?" I ask and the laugh a little, "It sounds too easy…"

He places himself in front of me and grabbing my shoulders he forces me on my feet. He gives me a small smile. I smile back, feeling just a bit better with myself.

"There is one thing I think will help you," he says.

I try not to bring to light the fact that the way he phrases himself forces me to ask him what he means. Tokegawa used to do the same thing and I found it all kinds of annoying.

"What?" I ask.

He places both of his hands on my shoulders and looks deep into my own eyes.

"You have to let some stuff go," he says, "All of the bad things sort of happened because you couldn't let go. Here you get another chance though, let this thing with Al go. Who knows…maybe he chooses to be with you, maybe with her, but you have to let the thing sort itself out."

"I…sure…ok," I answer with no real coherence, "I think I'm gonna go now, then."

He steps aside slowly almost as if it weighed him down. I never really thought that Aereth thought ill of me. After all, he helped me in the very beginning when I started to look for leads on Laughing Coffin. The big difference with him is that while he might not approve of everything I do, he'll allow me to do it; he won't get in the way. Yet, he did today, and I can only take that whole gesture to mean that he cares about me. Or at the very least he cares about what would've happened if he let me go inside that restaurant.

I head for the door and stop before leaving to take a deep breath. I'm about to exit the place when Aereth calls out for me.

"Hey!" he says.

"Yeah?"

"I'll see you back home for dinner," he says.

"I don't th-"

"It wasn't a question," he says.

I smile widely.

"Alright," I answer.

* * *

**Forty Eight Floor of Aincrad - Lindarth - Lisbeth's Smith Shop**

"I kind of thought the first time you would visit my shop you would do so to buy something," the pink haired blacksmith laughs.

"Hey come on, you gave me the tour once I stepped in," I huff, "Besides… I'm trying to open up to you here."

Lisbeth seemed like the person to go to if I needed a completely impartial opinion on something. I'm just slightly beginning to regret my decision as she is not taking me all that seriously. I bring her up to speed on my current situation, but try to be as vague as possible given some of the guys in the guild still frequent her for business. Sadly I cannot lie about anything else because she is friends with Asuna and thus she knows pretty much everything about the deal with Laughing Coffin and such. So for now, I have trouble with a boy, a boy that I don't want to let go despite the possibility of me coming between his relationship with another girl.

"I know, I know…" she says as she finishes polishing the tip of one of the spears she has on display.

"So…is it really so wrong that I don't want them to be together anymore?" I say, "I know it makes me sound like a shitty person but…I don't know."

She sets the spear back on display and grabs a sword that is hanging from the wall. She takes out a piece of cloth out of her inventory and starts cleaning the blade.

"Trust me, I know how you feel," she says.

"Huh? You do?"

"More than you know…"

She walks over to the counter of her shop and sets the sword over it. She laughs in a weird manner, probably trying to shake off some awkwardness. She continues to clean the sword and clears her throat.

"Yeah," she says, "I'm in a really similar situation…or I was? I, uh, I'm still figuring out how I feel about the whole thing."

I'm awfully curious but the tone in which she is talking and her body language make it seem like the topic isn't really something she would like to talk about. Then again, I could really use some insight on the topic itself.

"What happened?" I ask.

She sighs and stops cleaning the sword altogether. She hides the thing behind the counter and then set supports herself over it with both of her hands.

"About…two months ago I met a boy," she says.

"Was he cute?" I tease.

"Come on, you are asking me to get serious and you say things like that?" she grumbles.

"Sorry…" I say.

"Also he was super cute," she says.

We both laugh for a bit, there's something about this that feels unusual for me. In the real word I never got together to talk about boys with my friends. Doing so in a virtual world with a girl that I don't really have a close relationship with feels a bit funny. Either way I welcome any opportunity to genuinely laugh in this world.

"Either way, the point is that…I fell in love with him," she says and then gives me half a smile, "I…hehe, I told him that I liked him like several times."

"And the guy didn't do a thing?" I ask, "What an asshole."

"Well, uh, he couldn't exactly hear me…" she admits.

"Wait…what do you mean?"

"I might've yelled that I liked him several times as we were falling like from several hundred feet in the air?"

She can't be for real, what was she doing with that guy to begin with?

She comes out from behind the counter and locks the door leading to the rest of her house. She then does the same for the door that leads to her backroom where her furnace and other equipment is. It is getting kind of late so I guess this is a very subtle way of telling me that I should leave soon.

"I was going to let him know my feelings after, like for real I was going to tell him how I felt about him, but…" she stops for a second, "I found out a friend was interested in him as well. As a matter of fact she was interested in him way before I was."

I open my eyes, curious and surprised I want her to continue with how she dealt with the whole thing. While my current situation differs slightly from hers I believe her opinion on the matter might help me.

"What did you do?" I ask, "Did…did you still try to get him?"

"I chose not to," she says with a soft tone.

"Huh?" I exclaim, "Why not?"

"I tell you in a second," she says, "Help me close the windows first."

I'm left hanging as I do as she asks of me and close all of the windows in one side of the shop. By the time I finish she is already standing by the door which she opens just slightly, letting a cold breeze into the shop. I walk up to her and once I'm close enough she continues.

"I chose not to because I would rather keep both him and the girl who is interested in him as friends," she says, "Besides, this other girl would be a far better companion to him that I could ever hope to be."

It's a bit depressing to hear Lisbeth talking like that. She's normally incredibly smug and constantly boasting about something, but right now she's like a completely different person.

"So what would you suggest?" I ask.

"If you really like this person, you should let him choose," she says, "Sure, it might hurt a lot if he doesn't choose you, but in the end, don't you want to see him happy?"

Her words get to me and I think I'm finally able to understand a bit better. If I forced Al to just be with me I would be happy, but there's not really a way for me to know that he would be as well. I would like to see him happy, that's for sure, but…I also want to be happy. The idea tumbles around in my head but in the end all the time I've spent here with Lisbeth has robbed me of a chance to talk to Al about this situation.

"I just...I would want to be happy too, you know?" I say.

"And you can be, but perhaps if this guy can't be the source of it, you should find something else," she says, "With that whole thing with the Laughing Coffin done I'm sure you can find something else, after all you can finally relax right?"

I don't know if relax is the right word, but there is definitely a release of stress, removing the weight on my back. Sadly though, even if the thing with those bastards is done I still have to worry about fitting back into my own guild.

I sigh deeply and loudly and scratch the back of my head.

"Who's the boy?" I ask, curiosity getting the best of me.

"Ah, you probably don't know him," she says, blushing slightly.

"Aw, come on, try me," I chuckle.

She crosses her arm and giggles softly.

"His name is Kirito," she says softly.

"What?! That guy?" I shout, "Lisbeth, why? You can do so much better!"

Her cheeks turn bright red and she struggles with her words as she pushes me playfully.

"Sh-shut up! He is cute, and strong and…handsome," she says shyly, "You have no right to judge me on this matter; you think I don't know your whole problem is about Alshep!"

"Wh-what?!" I yelp, "It's not!"

"Hah!" she says and points at me with her hand, "It totally is!"

We keep teasing each other for a few minutes until we are both laughing at each other for no particular reason. Finally catching our breaths we exit the shop and I watch as Lisbeth locks the door to her nice piece of property.

"Say, want to have dinner with me and some friends?" Lisbeth asks, "We are going to a player run restaurant on the thirty seventh floor."

"I'll have to pass, thanks though," I say, "I'm going to have dinner at the guild house."

"Alright then," she says, "Take care and next time you come by buy something."

"I'll think about it."

We both walk together to the dirt road and she leaves in direction of the floor's gate. I stay back a bit to reflect on things. I can be selfish at any point I want to but Lisbeth is right, I shouldn't get in the way of the happiness of others.

"Mirai? You there?" I ask a bit aloud.

No answer. The only thing I hear is a nearby river flowing gently. Maybe I can find a way to be at peace. Slowly I'll try to right my wrongs with everyone, I'll do as both Aereth and Lisbeth suggested. I'll just have to work extra hard for it.

* * *

Crysina Here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter was beta read by DragonofAnnoth!

As I said last time, we'll be winding down for a while as we work our way to the end. I'm both very excited and very sad about the whole deal. This fic has now been a part of my life for over a year. I really don't know how to feel about this story coming to a close. Either way I can't express how happy I am that people enjoy it like you guys do.

**Electronic Ink O:** Yeah not only is the raid also mention in a half assed way in the novel but the way it is included in the Anime is just to make godly Kirito's legs tremble for a second. **IC0:** I always enjoy reading your reviews, they are like in depth and sometimes even go to places I didn't think about for the chapter haha.

Well that's that for this week! As always, if you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all, next week!

Next Chapter: "Dropping the Curtain"


	66. Chapter 66 - Dropping The Curtain

**Chapter 66: Dropping the Curtain**

**August/22nd/2024**

**Fifty Fifth Floor of Aincrad – West Mountain**

**Kayla**

I've always thought myself to be a person that prefers cold weather over hot. I remember that any time I would be bothered by hot weather in the real world, I would think of moving somewhere cold, somewhere with snow.

After being knee deep on the freaking stuff for the better part of the past two hours really makes me rethink that idea.

"I don't think I can feel my legs anymore," I mumble.

"Ehehe," Ruri laughs, "I can warm you up."

"Really? Right now, Ruri?" Elina groans.

"Hey, I don't mind an audience," she quickly replies.

"Please do refrain from such talk, let alone the action," I say flatly.

"Right, right," Ruri whispers close to my ear, "I'll wait till we are alone."

All of us girls decided to go along on a quest. We left the boys behind to take care of the house. The boys being Al, Billfray and Aereth. As I keep trudging through the snow I look over my shoulder to see the rather long line of girls following me. In order there's me, Ruri, Sinna, Elina, Esra and finally Aeri in the back. We are all wearing rather thick clothing given the weather; big jackets and coats that make us look like puffed up humans beings. Sinna is the best out of all of us. She wears about two jackets, a scarf that tightly wraps over half of her face and she hugs herself to conserve warmth. Even with all of that she is still shivering and shaking with every step she takes.

It's really at times like this when it's easy to notice that we are a majority, at the very least in our particular household. My mind does get curious, what is it that boys do when they are left alone. It's hard for me to picture Al doing anything with Billfray or Aereth. I mean they are friends, but what is it that dude friends do?

"So…" I ponder, "Anyone curious about what the guys are doing?"

I keep pulling my feet out of snow to push them back for a while with no answer from anyone behind me. I take a few more steps but then stop as I'm no longer hearing other steps behind myself. I turn around to see everyone with a confused look on their faces as they seem to be deep in thought.

"…what the hell would they even do together?" Ruri mutters.

"I have never seen them do anything else than small talk between each other…" Elina huffs, "Well even in real life that's just what guy friends do…no?

"I think Aereth is like friends with Mr. Guild Leader…," Sinna says, sounding astoundingly unsure of her statement.

"I can't say I've ever seen them hanging around with each other," Aeri mumbles.

Esra just shrugs and stares at me looking perplexed. The reaction from the group hits me by surprise. Literally no one knows how they interact with each other. I chuckle a bit and turn my head back to keep walking through the snowy mountain. I drag down my menu in order to check the info on the area, the map isn't really that helpful, but if we are following Lisbeth's directions correctly we shouldn't be that far away. We are to seek out "X'rphan the White Wyrm".

I swear to god I don't even know how to pronounce half of the enemy names as of lately.

Our blacksmith was kind enough to let us in a sort of player-made quest; apparently there's a pretty low chance of getting extremely rare items from X'rphan. That's not really the best thing you should lead with if you are trying to get people into a dangerous quest. She did however mention the fact that she would give us free enhancements and weapons if we were to bring back a lot of "Crystallite Ingots" which apparently this Wyrm shits out.

"Doesn't anyone have a problem with the fact that we are basically looking for dragon poop?" I ask.

"Wyvern poop!" Esra shouts.

"Wait, no," Elina butts in, "Isn't it a Wyrm?"

"What's the difference?" Sinna asks.

We take more than a few steps in complete and total silence.

"Aren't dragons the ones with two legs and like the arms attached to the wings?" Ruri says.

"No, those are Wyverns," Aeri says all the way from the back.

Once again we walk for a bit in complete silence. This time I count my steps. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight.

"Hmm, then what the hell are Wyrms like?" Aeri asks.

"I got it!" Ruri says with excitement, "This game is like sort of based off European stuff, right? That's why there's almost no Japanese swords and stuff."

"Ok…" I say, hoping for her to say more on the matter.

"Then!" she says, "A Wyrm is probably one of those that look like serpents, you know? Like a Japanese dragon!"

"But wouldn't that just make it a Japanese dragon?" Esra says.

"Nah, Wyrms are the ones that are like in oceans and stuff, they don't have wings," Aeri says.

"Ok, I give up," Ruri sighs.

"Can we leave it at giant lizard?" Elina huffs.

"But Edelweiss was a giant lizard," Sinna says sounding a bit down, "I don't want to hurt something that looks like Edelweiss."

"Wasn't he more like a Komodo dragon?" Esra asks.

"Stop!" I yell.

Everyone stops walking and they all start staring at me. I bit embarrassed I clear my throat and try to strike an authoritative pose. I puff my chest out, put my hand over the pommel of my rapier and look away into the mountain ridges.

"We are hunting a Wyrm, simple as that," I say firmly.

I find some satisfaction as I stare away into the snowy peaks not too far away and everyone quiets down for a while. I breathe in slowly, savoring the moment.

"Ok," Sinna says, "but what does it look like?"

"I…" I voice quietly, "have no idea."

They all collectively sigh and their eyes suddenly feel like daggers.

"Five thousand col, it's one of those with two legs!" Ruri says.

This time there's a collective "ugh" coming from everyone else but Ruri.

"Ten thousand?" Ruri mumbles.

We ignore her gambling issues and continue our trek through the mountain. One other thing Lisbeth mentioned was the fact that the Wyrm or whatever went out during the night, if we wanted to surprise the thing we should try to arrive at its nest during the day. The nest is located near the top of the mountain. The current plan is to get there while it is still sleeping and search for ingots without it noticing.

The plan was to go out early in the morning in order to make it to the top while there was still some sunlight. Sadly, we took more than the estimated time to get ready. We are nowhere near the top and the sun is already going into hiding. It really doesn't help that the further we go the deeper the snow seems to get.

We walk for about an hour or so and decide to spend the night in a cave-like opening that overlooks the ridges. It's nothing but solid rock, but at the very least the fact that it's sort of a cave makes it so there's no snow inside of it. And the view isn't half bad either. The moment we all sit down Esra already has a fire going and is going through her inventory to take out ingredients she is going to use to make us some late dinner. I sit close to the fire and extend my hands towards it. I breathe in deeply and rub my hands together; trying real hard to get some warmth other than the thick coat I'm wearing. Ruri jumps and lands on her knees close to me, she leans over me and chuckles for a brief moment. I just smile, but my main focus is on the fire that slowly grows larger.

"Say," Ruri whispers in my ear, "I know we sort of silently agreed not to touch the topic, but…aren't you curious about what happened like with Al, Elina, and Aeri?"

I feel goosebumps slowly ride down my spine as I wasn't expecting her voice so close to my ear.

"I am…" I say, "but like you said, we agreed not to touch the topic."

"Hmmmmmmmmmmmm," she sounds off, "but what if I just asked about it?"

"Please don't," I sigh, "For once we are sort of keeping the peace, let's not turn this into Eli shouting at Aeri or something."

She keeps getting closer and closer, Ruri seems to ignore the point at which two physical objects are unable to get any closer, yet she keeps on pushing onwards. It gets to the point where her cheek is so close to my own that I can feel the subtle movements inside her mouth on my cheek.

"You are going to ask no matter what I say, right?" I sigh.

"It's killing me not to know exactly what happened," she replies.

I push her away and stand up.

"Please don't," I say.

She stares at me with a pouty face, I keep my eyes on her as she slowly crosses her arms and blows up her cheeks. I place my hand over my eyes and sigh so loudly I bet even Esra turned her head towards me.

"I beg you, dear," I say and kneel down in front of her, I place my hands on her legs and get closer, "it would make me really happy if you didn't."

I look at her face and she is smiling like an idiot, her cheeks flushed, her eyes closed, and her head just slightly tilting to the side.

"Okaaay, honey," she says with glee, "I won't ask, hehehe."

She loves it when I call her names; on top of that she knows I'm not used to doing this kind of thing in public. So I'm able to more or less swing the situation my way as she is in the sweet trance of my voice.

"That is so cute," Esra comments with a smile.

"I, uh…" I blurt out, feeling surprised, "What is? Hahaha…."

"The way you talk to each other," she says, "You are a really lovey-dovey couple."

"We areeeee!" Ruri says, and wraps her arms around my neck to pull me close, "Aren't weeeee?"

I can tell she is still under my "spell" because the way in which she is speaking is absurdly stretched out and she is giggling like an idiot.

"I'm going out with Sinna, we saw some deer and rabbits while we were hiking here, maybe we can catch something nice for dinner," Elina says.

"That would be great!" Esra say quickly, "I forgot to pack any kind of meat…haha."

"We'll get some then!" Sinna says.

"We'll be back in an hour, maybe less," Elina says.

I wave them off and Ruri does the same while still pulling me close to her. Aeri sits close to my right and extends her hands to the fire, just like I did moments ago. It might because of what Ruri said, but I can't help it but to stare in her direction. On top of that I find myself overanalyzing everything she does. I pay attention to the way she rubs her hands together, the slight smile on her mouth as she stares into the fire. Esra is still meticulously setting her ingredients alongside each other; my best guess is that she is trying to figure out what she is going to with them once the meat gets here. We enjoy the silence, watching the fire grow in strength and seeing the last of sunlight slip out of sight over the mountains.

"I'm really hungry," Aeri says and chuckles.

"WHAT HAPPENED WITH YOU AND AL?!" Ruri shouts.

Immediately I grab Ruri's hair and pull it with all my strength, making her groan in pain as she begs for me to let her go.

"Haha, so, snow," I say desperately, "Crazy, it's like frozen water, huh?"

"Cut the shit Kayla," Aeri huffs, sounding pretty annoyed, "Ask your questions Ruri, because this is the only time I'll answer them. I'll only answer yes or no, though."

Despite me pulling her hair, Ruri sits back up. She has her head tilted towards my hand as I'm yet to let go of her hair.

"Did it really happen?" Ruri asks.

"Yes," Aeri replies.

"OH MY GOD," Ruri huffs, "Was he like…into it?"

"Shut up!" I cry, "I don't need to hear about this."

"No," Aeri says.

I let Ruri go and press my hands against my ears; sadly it's not enough to block the ongoing conversation out.

"Were you into it?!" Esra asks all of the sudden.

"Not you too!" I whine.

"Yes," Aeri admits, her cheeks blushing.

I start utter random noises on top of pressing my hands on top of my ears, anything that I can blurt out in order to make it clear that I'm uncomfortable, and I do not wish to hear where this ends. "Ahhh" "blablablabla". I wanna run away.

"Was he good?" Ruri asks.

"Holy shit, stop!" I yell.

"Sorry," Ruri whimpers.

"Sorry," Esra say quickly after.

"I…uh…sorry," Aeri mumbles.

I feel like a lecture is in order, but it's not like I have enough knowledge in the matter to even do so. I've been trying to ignore the issue altogether. As Ruri said, we made a silent agreement not to touch the subject I would rather things stayed that way. How uncomfortable the whole issue makes me feel just compares to when you send a very personal text to someone you didn't mean to. It's nerve-wracking.

"If I'm honest," Aeri mumbles, "It's been killing me that you guys didn't say anything about it."

"Huh, why?" Ruri says.

"We haven't really been speaking to each other except for anything other than awkward like two sentence conversations," Aeri says, "It's…well it's not nice, but it feels kind of great to just…gossip."

I stop covering my ears once I hear this, I can tell I'm looking at Aeri with a bit of pity, but for her sake I do my best to erase it. After all, she is my friend, and she didn't exactly wrong me in any way. She wronged my other friend, who is Elina. I feel a slight head ache as I try to process the whole thing in a quick go. Is it wrong to still want to have a normal friend relationship with Aeri? Should I look at her in a mean way just because of what she did?

"It's been sorta hard, I didn't want to pick a side…" Ruri admits.

"Well…you picked hers…" Aeri says.

"Don't be like that," Esra interrupts, "I mean, what were we supposed to do?"

"Y-yeah," I stammer, "I mean she was like devastated…and stuff."

Aeri stares into the fire and crosses her arms.

"I know…I just…" she mumbles, "It's been sort of hard for me too."

We sit close to the fire and grow silent all of the sudden. I guess it is indeed hard to talk about the subject. Even if Ruri is curious she is not the kind to just ask every single detail about what happened. Even someone as silly as Ruri knows where to draw the lines.

"I know it makes me a shitty person, so it's ok, I really don't hold anything against you…for doing what you did," Aeri says, "Can I ask you guys something about Alshep, though?"

"Shoot," Ruri says.

Aeri places her hands on top of her lap and looks around a bit anxiously. Probably making sure Elina is not about to pop out all of the sudden.

"How do you guys feel about him?" she asks.

Since that incident I have several words to describe my dear friend Al. In-between those words you can find, horrible, animal, weak-willed, cheater, heartless.

"He's a pig!" Esra shrieks and then quickly covers her mouth.

"I'm not sure, if I shouldn't feel offended by that as well…" Aeri mutters with a weak smile.

"I don't mean it as an offense to you…or Master…" Esra says.

Then what on earth could she mean by that. I'm willing to back her up on the comment, Al is a pig for doing what he did, and it's unforgiveable, there's no going around that. Cheating is a horrible thing, and the party that chooses to cheat on his or her partner should be punished. I shake my head at my own thoughts. I mean that's how I feel, but at the same time it's hard for me to express myself on the current matter.

"Then what could you possibly mean by it?" Aeri asks.

Esra sighs and keeps tending to the fire for it to not go out.

"Am I really supposed to hate him just because of one bad thing he did?" Esra asks.

I stop breathing for a brief moment as I take Esra's sentence in.

"I mean…he is not perfect, nor is this the first mistake he has made," Esra says, "but am I really to hate the man that has done his very best to keep me safe and alive all this time? For that matter, am I supposed to hate you, Aeri?"

I hear the fire crackle, followed by a strong gust of wind surging briefly into the place where we are currently sitting at.

"Fuck…you are right…" I say without thinking.

"Colorful language," Ruri smiles.

"Geez, shut up," I say, "She is right…you know?"

"She is," A voice backs me up.

"Right?" I say while turning my head to the source of the voice, only to find Elina, "Fu-Eli…hi! You're back, haha so what's up with fire? It's just like heat, fuel and oxygen, huh?! What the fuck am I saying?"

She laughs in a really weird way and out of her inventory she takes out two rabbits that are as white as the snow itself. She looks like she didn't just catch us discussing the topic of her boyfriend cheating on her as she hands the rabbits over to Esra. Esra takes the rabbits with shaking hands and starts prepping the meal with shocked eyes.

"I'm sorry if I implied you should hate Aeri or Al," Eli says, "If you are going to do either one, you should do so for your own reasons, not based on what happened."

I glance at Aeri, who is covering her face with her hands and breathing a bit erratically. I start feeling anxious myself and just cough to clear my throat.

"Can I ask something?" Ruri says.

Jesus Christ, no matter how much I love her she is just asking too many questions. Elina doesn't vocally answer but she gives Ruri a subtle nod.

"Did you and Al make up?"

Aeri is still covering her face and instead of facing the fire she straight up turns around and ignores the current conversation. Elina gives Aeri's back a steely glare and then answers.

"On second thought, let's not discuss this any further please," she answers, "We have a Wyrvenagon to fight tomorrow."

Elina finishes her sentence with a soft laugh and a smile. Ruri laughs, albeit a bit awkwardly, but she laughs nonetheless. Any other person would think Elina said what she did in order to avoid feeling uncomfortable herself, but after really analyzing the scene and I can't help but to think she said it in order to avoid Aeri getting any more uncomfortable.

* * *

Esra was more than on time to wake us all up by the time the sun was just staring to rise. Thanks to that we all walked up to the Wyrm's nest in a matter of minutes. We are all very tired, but we still managed to make the climb. Once we arrive we are posed another issue, that issue being the fact that the dragon is sleeping right on its nest, and the nest of the lovely thing happens to be a hole that is several meters deep. Slowly getting closer we slowly close in on the edge in order to stare down on the gray-ish beast.

"This is just a big freaking hole," Aeri yawns.

"And that thing takes up like all the space," Elina says, "It's going to be hard to search for the ingots if we don't kill it."

"Yay, it doesn't look like Edelweiss at all!" Sinna cheers.

"So it has two legs and its arms seem to be attached to its wings…" Esra ponders.

"Haha! Who owes me money?!" Ruri laughs.

"No one even agreed to your bet to begin with," I sigh.

We all stare down at the Wyrm or whatever in silence. Shortly after we all sigh in unison, after that we all laugh together for what seems the first time in ages. I happen to catch Aeri and Elina briefly smiling at each other for a second. I smile as well, it's would be nice if we could just get along, like we did back then.

A flash of light blinds me for a second as I see Elina equipping her buckler and sword. She unsheathes her sword and readies a skill up. Her blade is shining bright pink as she leisurely swings it in front of her.

"Alright, let's kill this thing, whatever it really is," she says with a smile.

Aeri equips her gauntlets and slams her closed fist against her open hand.

"Let's do this," she says with a grin and jumps down.

Eli follows her as she lets out a gentle chuckle. Esra, Ruri, Sinna and I stay back for a few seconds.

"I guess they'll slowly start getting along, again," Esra mutters.

Sinna breathes in and unsheathes her short sword. She jumps down without any other word and seconds later we hear the Wyrm screech.

"On step at a time…" Ruri says and slowly tilts her body to effortlessly fall into the monster's nest.

"So, are you going to jump down now or is it my tu-"

I see Esra smile as she jumps into the hole, leaving me with no one else to talk to. The monster finally rises up from the hole, on top of it I can see every single one of my friends, clinging to it as they try to keep attacking the thing. Ruri is dangling from its tail and everyone else seems to be spread out over its back. I feel the sheer force of the wind the monster generates as it flaps its wings. I cover my face for a few seconds and then reach down to take my rapier out of my sheathe.

"Jump here!" Ruri shouts, and hangs on to the monster with only one hand, "I'll catch you!"

I see her other hand stretching out towards me in the distance. I take a step back and start running towards the edge of the hole. I jump with all my strength and slowly see my hand closing in on Ruri's.

"This oughta be fun!"

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter was beta-read by DargonofAnnoth!

Well I had fun writing this, it's probably one of my most relaxed and easy going chapters as of late. It's just characters talking, kind of having a good time you know? I was going to write the fight scene with the Wyrm but in the end it felt like fat that just didn't need to be there. Either way I apologize if you were expecting a fight.

**Electronic Ink 0: **I'm so glad you think so! From the start I set out to make a story that would blend in with Canon so I'm so glad you appreciate it haha. Thank you so much! **DevilHunter: **I'll be honest here, it maybe was because I read your review so late at night and I was so tired from being sleep deprived but it made me tear up a little. I'm so glad I can make Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds in a way that makes your Sundays fun. Thank you so much for your support. I hope I can keep making Sundays awesome!

Well I have no real further comments for today, I have next week off from Uni so I will do my best to write some chapters or maybe play video games. I just got The Division and it's kind of neat, I enjoy killing people in the Dark Zone as they are about to extract all their loot. ANYWAYS! If you like what you read please leave a review! If you haven't left one so far how abut you do? I would love to hear your opinion about my story! I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Maid to Serve"

* * *

**Extra Chapter 9 – What Dude Friends Do**

**Alshep**

"We'll back in a day, maybe two, Master," Esra says before closing the door to the house.

"Yeah, take care," I say.

I sigh once the door is completely shut and turn around to see Billfray and Aereth sitting on the couch not too far from the dining table. Billfray coughs and Aereth slightly moves to set his arm over the armrest. Without uttering a word I make my way to the couch and sit next to Billfray.

I've never been left alone with both of them at the same time. I mean we usually talk about this or that, but I can surely say we've never been left alone like this. It almost feels as we are being sort of forced to interact with each other. I like them, they're cool guys, but this whole situation just feels weird. I try to think of ways to open up a conversation but come up with nothing. I start getting so uncomfortable and awkward that I start tapping my fingers over my laps. I practically hear Billfray's and Aereth's eyes grind as they turn to see me.

"I…uh…" I cough, "I see you got a new spear, Aereth."

"Yeah, it has twice the durability of my last one," he answers.

"Huh, that's pretty neat," Billfray comments.

"Yeah," Aereth replies.

What the hell is this awkward conversation?

"So, how's the new armor?" Aereth asks me.

"Well, it's got twice the dura….bility as my…last one," I say.

We all grow quiet and stare into nothing for more time that we should have.

"Wanna get drunk in the middle of town and see who makes it back to the house first?" Billfray suggests.

"Sounds like a plan!" I say and spring up from the couch.

"How bout we all bet six thousand col?" Aereth adds, "Winner takes all."

"Right on!" Billfray says as he stands up.


	67. Chapter 67 - Maid to Serve

**Chapter 67 - Maid to Serve**

**September/1****st****/2024**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

**Esra**

"I'm late!" I scream as I sit up in bed.

My sudden surge of energy is gone in the blink of an eye as my eyes droop and a long drawn out yawn escapes my lips. Still very drowsy I bring my hands to my eyes and rub them gently. I blink consciously a few times and look around my darkened room. I drag my menu into existence and take a look at the current time.

-5:45 A.M.-

I woke up before the alarm again.

I let my hands drop to my lap and rub my legs before turning my body to the side and letting my legs dangle from the edge of my bed.

I get up and stand on my tiptoes making sure to stretch my arms out as I do. It's always great to stretch right when you wake up. I flip the light switch right over my night stand and close my eyes so the sudden flood of light doesn't blind me. I yawn once more, this time I yawn so strongly a single tears rolls off the corner of my left eye. I pat my cheeks and shake my head a little, gotta wake up. Need to get the day on the road!

I make my bed up quickly, and humming a simple tune I head to the door. Exiting my room places me a few steps away from the kitchen's door. It's also rather close to the spiral staircase that takes you to the different floors of the house. Taking a peek at living room's couches I'm able to see that once again Master is not sleeping there. A good thing I like to think, but it still just slightly troubles my mind. I should steer clear of matters that don't concern me though.

"Esra?" I hear someone call out.

Surprised I turn on my heels and see the kitchen's door completely ajar. Ruri stares at me under the door's frame, her eyes shining in an ominous way amidst the darkness.

"Ahh!" I scream but quickly cover my mouth.

"Heehee," she laughs, "Did I scare ya?"

I nod and a wide grin spreads across her face. I notice she is wearing a hoodie that seems too big for her. It's zipped up all the way and the ends of it reach a little past her thighs. It looks comfy to be honest.

"What were you doing in the kitchen?" I ask quietly.

"I was hungry," she says as she takes a bite out of a slice of cake she is holding with only her hand.

"Do you want a plate for that?" I ask.

It's merely a formality from my part, it's killing me to see her hold her food like that. Not only is the cake rather mushy but it's almost slipping through her hands. My eyes are solely fixated on her hand and I'm about ready to dive if even a little tiny piece of that cake decides to go rogue fall on the floor.

"Nah, it's ok," she says and takes a bite out of it, "What are you doing up so early? I mean I got hungry, but what are you doing? It's kind of weird seeing you without your maid costume."

"Uniform," I stress, "either way, I get up at this hour every day."

"Geez, why would you do that to yourself?"

It's not like it's a nuisance for me, ever since I started working in this house, all that time ago under Master Galahad it's been nothing but routine. I enjoy it to an extent, it keeps me busy and I've grown fond of it, on my end I have no complaints whatsoever.

"So I can clean, and ready the house for your use, it's my job," I say with a smile.

"Hmm," she mutters and takes yet another bite of the cake, almost finishing it, "So what do you do at this hour?"

"Well," I start and shift a little, "I usually ready the baths for whoever wants to take a bath in the morning."

"You ready the ba-" she mumbles, "Wait, you mean it's not like a game thing that they are always ready?"

As a matter of fact it is not. There's a menu in which you can control the water's temperature, fragrance and quantity in the room where you undress. It's a bit hidden and I believe myself to be the only one who knows of its existence.

"No, it's all me," I boast a bit proudly.

"Can I come with?" She asks, "I mean, I'm already up and Kayla sleeps like a damn log."

"Sure," I agree quickly.

Perhaps I can cut a bit of the morning work if she is coming along. I put my right hand on my chin and smile.

"But only if you help me out with some chores," I add.

"Alright, I can do that," she answers.

"Alright then," I say and turn around, "Follow me."

The bathroom is the last door on the left to the staircase on the ground floor of the house. There's a decently sized changing room and then you have the bath, which is rather big. All of the NPC maids would get up early to take a quick bath and do their chores when I was doing the quest line of this house. At first it was kind of awkward to bathe along with them, but there was something odd about them, they were intelligent AIs pretty much like Sylvianna on that secret inn. All of them knew me by name and even made small talk with me from time to time. Never once did I hear them say the same line.

I open the door to the bath's changing room still deep in thought and I find myself smiling. While I can admit it was awkward at first, back then everything was pretty relaxed, there was no drama, only me, the maids and Master Galahad. It's not like I would like to go back to that, being with everyone else here is also great, but back then…none of my friends were dead. I guess the fact that I didn't really have any helped.

Ruri comes in behind me and with childlike awe opens her eyes and starts looking around.

"You are right!" she says, "Normally when I come in here I can already feel how steamy it is inside the bathroom! How do you do it?! Where do you turn it on?!"

I set the whole bathroom to be off during the night, I know there is no energy or water consumption I should be worried about, but leaving the thing going for more than a day generates mold. The house is just one big chore, the rooms and lobby are quick to gather dust and the bathroom generates mold if not taken care of as well. I don't mind to sound too prideful, but without me this house would fall apart.

I walk to the corner of the room where a small hamper is placed on the floor and move it to the side with my foot. Under it is a small panel that lights up with options once it's uncovered.

"The settings for the bath can be set on this panel," I say.

"Aha!" she says and then chuckles mischievously, "So it's hidden! Perfect hiding place since no one really takes their clothes off without the menu. Well, I do but that's reserved for when doing other activities."

She grins and giggles in her usual manner, the usual manner involves the fact that she just thought about something naughty. I smile through her perverted comment and get on my knees to set the bathroom up. I've never really done this with anyone else around so for this time alone I decide to ask Ruri on her preferences.

"So you want it to smell like something in particular?" I ask.

"Oh my god, yes!" she says with excitement and crouches just next to me, "Is there like a vanilla aroma, or something?"

"There is…I think…," I say as I start looking in the fragrance tab.

"And make the water overflow out of the bath!" she adds.

"Why?"

"Because that way it looks cooler!" she says.

I don't quite understand her request but I oblige nonetheless, after all she is going to help me scrub the whole place. Setting the bath for Ruri's preference I stand back up and once again cover the panel with the hamper. Like a giddy little girl Ruri slides the door leading into the bath open and peeks inside with an awestruck gasp.

I take a peek myself and as the subtle smell of vanilla hits my nose I'm able to see the bath slowly overflowing with water. The water reaches the very top of the bath and begins sliding down the sides, right into the small canals that lead the water out into the drain. It looks like a pleasant and gentle waterfall.

"It does look cool," I admit.

"See!" she says, "Told ya."

Out of my menu I take out two sponges and a little vial that contains a solution of my creation that works like a kind of soap to clean surfaces. If you spend enough time in the cooking grid you realize you can make a lot of things other than food. I grab Ruri's hand and place a sponge on her open palm.

"Now then, we are going to scrub the whole place down," I say.

She nods as she takes hold of the sponge; I apply a bit of my solution over it and do the same with the sponge in my hand. Without thinking I unequip my pajamas through my menu, leaving me only in my underwear. I feel my hair stand on its end as I realize in front of whom I just casually undressed. Force of habit, I do not clean the bathroom with my uniform on, if I did it would get all damp and uncomfortable to wear for the rest of the day. My eyes dart quickly in Ruri's direction and I can see her staring at my body with blushing cheeks.

"Now, hehe," she chuckles, "Is scrubbing the whole place down a euphemism for something?"

"N-no!" I say as I awkwardly cover my body up with my hands, "You…you can't clean the place with clothes on…it's cumbersome. Stop being such a perv."

"Alright," she says, "I won't stare…too much."

"Just don't stare at all!" I whimper.

She nods and then takes a step into the bathroom. She stops quickly and takes a step back.

"Right, right no clothes," she mumbles and takes off the one piece of clothing she is wearing, revealing that she is wearing absolutely nothing underneath it.

For some reason I'm not exactly surprised at the fact that she is not wearing any underwear. I walk in behind her and slide the door closed behind me. Without me needing to tell her something else Ruri is quick to start scrubbing the sides of the bath. As the water overflows it quickly rinses off the areas she cleans.

I get on my knees close to the door and starts scrubbing the floor myself. The sound of the sponges brushing against the marbled surfaces is one I'm oddly fond of. It's particular and unique enough to be recognized as the sound of "cleaning".

"I gotta say though," she huffs, "Cleaning things with little to no clothes, you are really into some weird kinky things, huh?"

"I am not!" I yelp.

With Ruri's help it takes half the time it would usually take for me to clean the bathroom. Once we are done as I would do if I were alone, we take a bath. The aroma of the room helps me a lot. I've never applied this particular smell to the water, but the vanilla smell is very relaxing. We probably stay in the water for more time than I'm regularly used to, but after all we did finish earlier than expected so there's no time lost in staying a while longer.

Once out of the bath I normally change into my uniform and dust the all of the foyer, the dining table, book shelves, chairs, paintings. Ruri aids me in this task as well, however she does so poorly. Every single area she claims to have already been through I end up making another pass as I'm not comfortable on her performance. I find myself feeling nostalgic once more. When I started out the head maid would do the same after I helped her out. She forced every other maid to call her Miss B, it was a bit of a joke between the other maids that the B stood for something in particular, but I always thought it stood for Boss. Even if she was sort of the boss, by the end of the quest line I already outranked her.

"I can't believe this…" Ruri sighs as she allegedly finishes dusting one of the multiple paintings in the walls of the second floor, "And you do this every day?"

"That I do," I answer as I make another pass through the paintings she just took care of.

"You really deserve something," she says and leans on the wall, close to a portrait of my old master, Master Galahad, "You should do this later on the day, that way I'm sure everyone would praise you."

"It's not about the praise," I smile, "It's never been about the praise."

She leans a bit more comfortably against the wall as she sets her right foot against it and tilts her head to the side like a curious puppy.

"What do you mean?" she asks.

"Ah…" I mumble, "I mean it like…my boss once said…."

Miss B said some pretty inspirational stuff back when she was still around among all the things she said I clearly remember something particular. Miss B used to say that a maid, or butler for that matter, should never set out on a task looking for praise, he or she should set out with the simple goal of making someone's day a bit easier. Simple really, and in a way I think it paves the whole being a servant thing. If a servant was only out to get praised they would only get disappointed, but if you do something just for the sake of helping others, I can make testament to the fact that it's just so much more rewarding.

To all of this Master Galahad had something to add. He told me that the only day praise should be accepted by a maid is the day when she is dismissed, for that means that she has completed her job.

"Esra? You kind of stopped midsentence there," Ruri says.

"I, uh, well, you see," I stutter, "I just like helping people, it's all I've ever done, even back in the real world."

"I see," she says with a grin, "What's this about a boss?"

"Just, haha, forget it, it's nothing," I say nervously.

The only two people I've ever told about my connection to this place are Master Al, and Daath, who is no longer with us. Thinking about the whole deal is still a bit embarrassing for me, so I've avoided at all costs that other members of the guild find out what ties me to this place.

I see her stance falter a little and she tries to steady herself, but places her hand on the frame of master Galahad's portrait. I try to reach out for her, but I'm not fast enough. Her hand pushes the portrait with quite some force and manages to take it off the wall.

"Careful!" I say somewhat loudly.

I find myself holding the portrait in my hands before offering Ruri any kind of aid. Her groan is muffled by the carpets that she face planted into.

"I'm alright," she says in exaggerated pain, "I'll live."

She sits up and rubs her nose gently.

"I'm sorry about that…" she apologizes.

"Don't worry," I say.

I'm about to set the portrait back on the wall when Ruri stops me. She places her left hand on my fore arm and peeks at the back of the portrait, gasping in surprise.

"There's something taped on the back," she says, "It has your name on it!"

"My name?" I question, "What do you mean?"

"Check it out," she says as she fans at me with a small envelope she just tore off the back of the portrait.

I set the painting down and leave it resting against the wall. Ruri has stopped fanning the thing at my face and I can now see the envelope with my name written on it. It's a very small yellow-ish envelope, my mind can only try to go and assume that it probably contains a letter. I slowly take the envelope from Ruri who within the second is standing behind, begging for me to open it and check out the contents.

The moment I open the envelope I can hear a notification popping up. Perhaps I got a message from someone; it's probably Lisbeth finally getting back to me about those weapons I ordered from her. Putting the envelope in my hand in the background of my priorities for a second I drag down my menu to see what the notification was all about. My eyes begin to water as I see that it's not a message but a quest update on something I thought I finished long ago.

-A House in Barrowdell: Task 65-

* * *

"To Esra,

If you found this it means that you finally decided to retire that old portrait of mine from the hallways of the house. I must look exceptionally younger in that portrait; after all it was made a few years ago, before you even arrived to my home. I cannot help it but to be curious as to what is the reason you took down this portrait. Did you think it was no longer adequate? Where you just cleaning it? Perhaps you were mad at me? Or perhaps, does the house have a new master? Whatever the reason, I'm sure you've found this a long time after my departure. I believe I should first explain something of utmost importance; first and foremost, I still live, however I'm still quite ill. The reason I left the house in your care is because I trust you will make of it a place where more people other than a tired old man can live in. I believe that you can make that dusty house a home for other people, hopefully these people you will hold dear in your heart.

I still feel guilty for leaving you in the way I did. Not only did I cowardly escape as I sent you on a fool's errand, but I made sure every single other maid in the house also escaped from you. I will forever hate myself for taking this decision, but I would like to think that in the long run everything worked out. The whole point of this letter is rather simple, but extremely selfish; I have one last request of you.

I would like to see you once more. There's something I never properly did, and after all this time I think it's finally time to do so. Inside this envelope you can find directions to where I'm currently passing my days. It's not far from Barrowdell, but it might prove a bit difficult to find. Miss B was kind enough to offer to take care for me. Then again, offer is the wrong word to use in this situation; she actually demanded to do so, and I've been under her care ever since we all left the house to you. I'm sure she will be happy to see once again if you so choose to visit me one last time. Under that hard, bossy exterior she has a gentle and soft heart. I'm sorry for leaving you all alone inside that big house. It must be lonely, but I just couldn't bear the thought of you or any of the other maids seeing me in this state. Yet I ask you to come and see me once more, but the reason is that I can't just pass away before doing this one last thing. I hope I will be able to see you soon.

, Galahad Rowbel"

* * *

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Barrow's Canyon**

Walking the very edge of this canyon sparks up some bad memories. If I'm not mistaken this is where Daath and Kato were murdered. I swallow my own spit as I take a short look down the canyon. It's a long fall, so I take a few steps away from the edge and breathe out heavily.

I'm carrying a basket with some fresh bread and fruits, along with a bottle of liquor that I often bought when serving master Galahad. I used to bring a similar basket from the market almost every morning. It takes me back in a way, to the point I'm once again at the verge of tears. I have neat cocktail of emotions brewing inside me. I'm excited to see Miss B and Master Galahad again, but I'm also upset. How could they do this to me? They were all I had back then, and they just left me. Then again, they _are_ merely some AI manipulated NPCs…but still, they are unlike any other AI NPCs I've ever interacted with. I spot a small cottage in the distance; it overlooks the canyon but also seems to be half hidden in the forest just before the canyon's edge. My heart starts beating faster as I approach the cozy looking abode. The place is a bit small, it probably has two small bedrooms at most, and I bet the kitchen is really small. There has to be a kitchen, even if Master Galahad retired somewhere like this he still likes his meals to be cooked on the spot. I become a little too conscious of my train of thought and blush a bit in embarrassment. Am I really worrying this much about someone who isn't even real?

I drag my feet the last few steps before I'm standing in front of the wooden door of the cottage. I squeeze the basket's handle with both of my hands and take a deep breath. I keep holding on to the basket with one hand and raise the other to knock on the door. I'm but an inch away from knocking when the door opens. The door slowly swings inside and out of the small cottage emerges Miss B. A soft breeze makes itself present, making her silky black hair sway gently from side to side. She still wears her black and white maid uniform. She stares at me with her cold green eyes and fixes her glasses into place with her left hand.

"Miss B!" I say surprised.

She smiles at me and her eyes narrow into a warm look I've never seen on her face. She hastily closes the distance between us and hugs me closely. I'm taken so much by surprise that I drop the basket I'm carrying. I hear the basket hit the ground just next to my feet and I'm even able to hear as the bottle of liquor rolls out of it. I bring my hands up and wrap them around Miss B. I nest my chin over her shoulder and sigh into tears. As I feel the small droplets in my eyes start rolling down my cheeks I squeeze her tight and start pressing my lips harshly against each other in order to avoid crying out loud.

"I'm so glad to see you," she whispers.

I lose the last semblance of composure on my person and only squeeze her even more as loud sobs start escaping my mouth.

"I…I missed you…so much," I stifle.

"I missed you too," she says softly, trying to hide how her voice breaks just slightly.

These emotions resurfacing all of the sudden break me. I'm brought back to the days when I arrived at Master Galahad's home. How every single maid was asking me to help out, asking me to join them. I didn't think much of it at first, but they all were the very first friends I made in this game. Months before the guild, the maids, Miss B, Master Galahad, they were all I had. They were my friends, my family. I stand still burying my face in Miss B's shoulder as I can't seem to stop crying. She doesn't do anything else but try to comfort me. She gently slides her hand up and down my back and pats my head with care. She hushes me with a soft voice and waits till I'm done tearing up.

She helps me gather the things I dropped on the ground and says she is surprised I remembered about the liquor even after all this time. I thought that maybe because they are NPC they wouldn't really have a grasp of the time I kept them waiting. However she explains to me that for the longest time she thought I would actually never show up. I feel horrible for a minute, maybe longer. To think that they have been waiting for me all this time, that I left them waiting, it makes me feel like a horrible person.

She invites me inside and closes the door as soon as I make my way in. The place is brightly lit thanks to multiple candles and a warm fire is burning just under a chimney. It's so quiet inside I can hear the wood crackle. The whole place feels like a warm hug, I've never been here before but for some reason I feel so welcome and safe.

"Would you like to see him now?" she asks.

I set my basket over a small couch near the fireplace and nod at her. Feeling a bit nervous I hold my own hands together and set them just over my apron.

"Yes," I answer as firmly as I'm able to.

I follow Miss B deeper into the cottage until she stands in front of a door. She knocks on with a firm and heavy hand.

"Master Galahad?" she asks.

A deep, husky voice answers to her knock.

"Let yourself in Barbara."

My mind finds an odd release in finally finding out what the B in Miss B stands for, but I quickly forget all about as I'm able to hear Master Galahad's voice. I begin to tear up once again and as soon as Barbara opens the door. I make my way in before she does. The room is dimly lit compared to everything else I was able to see in the small home. Master Galahad is propped up in a sitting position thanks to several pillows that support his back. His head slowly turns to me; his usually well-kept gray beard is now scraggy and overgrown, sticking out of his chin and cheeks as some kind of untrimmed little vines. His hair is in a similar state, back in Barrowdell he made sure to always comb his hair back, but now it partially covers his forehead and it seems to be graying as well. Once he realizes who he is seeing his eyes widen with surprise.

I throw myself on my knees right on the edge of his bed and throw my upper body over his legs. He grunts at my sudden physicality, but within seconds he is already placing his hand over my head.

"Master Galahad!" I cry.

"Esra…" he says weakly, "You came."

"I'm so sorry I took so long!" I sniffle, "I never thought of even taking that portrait down!"

Once again I leave myself in a state where I pretty much force, my master this time, to comfort me. After a while I'm finally done with the outpour of emotions and back away from Master Galahad. I still remain on my knees but at the very least I'm no longer putting my weight on top of him.

"I'm so glad to finally see you," he says.

"Me too," I answer.

Barbara kneels down next to me and places her hands on her lap.

"I was telling her how I thought she would never show up," she says.

I swallow my own spit as I take a look at Master Galahad's face. He smiles gently and chuckles, the first time I've heard something resembling a laugh coming out of him.

"I never gave up hope," he says.

"You never did, Master," Barbara says, also with a smile on her face.

"Are…are you any better, Master?" I ask.

He coughs loudly, but then does his best to clear his throat and brush it off as nothing. I feel as if I get my answer with that action alone.

"Sadly, I can't say that my condition has improved," he says, "Although I can say that it also has not worsened."

"I'm glad to hear that," I reply.

"Did you take ownership of the house?" he asks.

"I did not," I answer.

"Did someone else?" Barbara asks.

I nod and smile in her direction.

"I've had a new Master for over a year now," I say, "He is a great man."

"Is he really?" Master Galahad asks.

I find myself a bit bothered by his question. Of course Al is a great man, he's done so much for us. I will not tolerate this kind of talk even if it is coming from my previous Master.

"He is," I say with a bit of a bitter tone.

"Hey, watch your mouth," Barabara mumbles.

"It's quite alright Barbara," Master Galahad says, "I shouldn't have questioned that, I'm sure whoever Esra is serving is more deserving of respect than myself."

Master Galahad starts coughing once again, this time without signs of stopping. His coughing fit goes on for so long that Barbara gets up and fetches him some water. I stand up myself and try to straighten him as much as possible. It's not until Barbara comes back with water that he stops coughing. Finally calming down he takes a few sips of water and clears his throat.

"I should move on to the reason I called you here," he says.

I nod and return to my knees.

"I never truly dismissed you, did I?" he asks.

I start feeling a weird pain in my chest.

"You didn't," I say.

"It has been bothering me for the longest time," he says, "I apologize for never doing so, for you to be calling me Master when you already have another. I'm a bad person."

"But Master Galahad," I say, "It's alright, there rea-"

"Esra, thank you for tending to me back in that big house in Barrowdell," he cuts me off, "As of today I beg you to no longer refer to me as your Master, as I'm not anymore."

The pain gets a bit sharper and the need to cry starts trying to claw its way out of my throat once again.

"You are now dismissed," he says and gives me a warm smile, "You did a great job."

I feel my lips form a big smile over my face, yet I feel tears trickle down to my lips. I'm so happy, but at the same time I feel a deep sadness. I bow down to the point where my forehead is touching the floor.

"Thank you for having me," I say in between my tears and stifled breathing.

LBLBLBLBLB

"I'm sure Master would be happy if you made the time to come again," Barbara says as she opens the door for me, "After all, I doubt he'll leave us any time soon. He's always been stubborn."

I step outside in the cold breeze of the night. Exiting the warm cottage contrasts greatly as I even shiver from the sudden change into cold temperature.

"I'm sure I can make some time to come by again," I say.

"I'm so glad you decided to come," she smiles, "I'll see you soon then."

I nod and make a little bow and suddenly have a bit of an urge to do something.

"I'll see then, Bar. Ba. Ra," I tease.

I raise my head to see a less than impressed stare from her. I laugh awkwardly as I watch her eyebrows burrow.

"I'm sorry," I whimper.

She laughs soundly and pats my head.

"It's alright, I'm only joking," she says.

She waves at me from her hip and closes the door.

I never thought she would even understand what the word "joke" meant. I turn on my heels and start making my way through the forest. Cutting through the forest should cut the time I make back to the house in at least half compared to the time I made by walking through the canyons edge.

I few minutes in through the forest I spot a particular figure in the distance, a black hooded figure standing still in-between a few trees. I reach behind me with my right hand and take my dagger out of its sheathe. As soon as I have my weapon in front of me the black hooded figure dashes towards me. It swings a golden sword at me and as soon as I'm within reach. I hop back and deliver a roundhouse kick to the figure's head. With my kick I manage to take the hood off of its face, revealing a man with red hair that I'm not particularly fond of.

"Klaus," I seethe.

It would seem the raid performed to clear out Laughing Coffin fell short by just one person.

"I genuinely thought you would be utter shit at combat," he grunts.

He stands upright and points his sword at me once again. I don't answer his taunt; I drag my right foot back a little and get in more comfortable defensive position. I could take him down right here; I just need to be careful. He swings at me again and this time I duck and slash his stomach as I dash past him. I turn around and see him get angry as he presses his free hand over the glowing gash I just made.

"You bitch!" he groans.

Once again without putting too much thought into it he lunges at me, he raises his sword above his head and tries to attack me with a vertical strike. I slap his blade away with my own and pull my armed hand back. I hear a subtle whirring sound and unleash a flurry of stabs on Klaus. I hit his stomach a couple more times, then his chest about four times and finish up by driving my blade clean through his elbow. I twist and turn the blade making my cut wider. I'm close to detaching his arm from his elbow when he kicks me away. I bring my guard up and feel his steel clash against my own. I lose a hold of my weapon and with the swing of his sword it's sent a few feet away from me.

"Now, let's finish this!" he yells.

His thrusts his sword and I bend my body backwards; I see the blade missing me and going over my stomach by just an inch or so. I place both of my hands on the ground behind my head and push myself into a handstand, kicking the blade out of his hand in the process. I keep my momentum going and move my body to land right back on my feet. Luckily the golden sword fails through the air in my direction and I make a gamble to catch it. I manage to get a hold of it and attack Klaus' injured arm, this time successfully cutting it off at the elbow.

"Fuck!" he groans.

I remain silent and waste no time in continuing my attack. I swing at his chest, at his other arm, legs, face. I manage cuts in every single area I target. I'm going to do it; I'm going to kill the man that killed my friends all that time ago. I'm about to drive the impressive looking sword right in between his eyes when I freeze, sadly not out of my own volition. My hand shakes, as I struggle to bring the blade any closer to Klaus. I track the length of my arm down until I see a hand with a leather glove seizing my wrist. A man with a purple looking scar on his right cheek grins at me as he keeps squeezing my wrist.

"You put up a good fight young lady," he says,

"What took you so fucking long?" Klaus complains to the man.

"I was watching this girl," the man says with an eerie hint of relish in his tone, "she is amazingly capable."

I'm distracted by the sudden pause in my attack and the casual back and forth between the man and Klaus. It suddenly hits me, I've seen him before. He was also present when Owl and Regi were killed. In fact this is the man that killed Reginald.

"You!" I say with hoarse voice, "You were also there!"

In a desperate attempt to do something I throw a punch with my free hand. With a laugh he stops my fist with his other hand and pulls me in harshly to give me almost migraine inducing head-butt. I fall on my back as I hold my head.

"Bag her already," the man says.

"You brought the rope right?" Klaus asks.

I'm still trying to recover from the other man's attack as I try to get back on my feet. When I open my eyes again I see Klaus move closer to me and cover my head with a black sack. Despite only having one hand able he tightens it around my neck and I feel him kick my stomach. He keeps kicking me for a while; I flail my arms around to no avail as I'm unable to predict the direction of his next attack. A sudden force takes hold of my arms and pulls them behind me, I keep struggling, but in a few heart beats I can't move my hands at all. I feel the rope binding them together and make one last attempt at trying to break free. Once I start showing any actual effort I'm hit in the head with something metallic. The sharp end of a sword should cut through my skin, but this blow just feels blunt and heavy. I hear the loud thud the weapon makes against my head and stop struggling as the hit seems to be bouncing in my head. I hear both Klaus and the man laughing, but it almost sounds too far away.

"I hope this girl proves to be worth the trouble," the man says.

"Oh, don't you worry PoH, back when I had a guy inside their little group he often mentioned this girl knows pretty much everything there is to know about everyone in that guild," Klaus says, "Besides, even if we don't get any information out of her, I assure you we are going to have some fun."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This chapter was beta-read by DragonofAnnoth!

This chapter I've had planned since chapter 27 of my fic, the one called "A Place of Our Own". I don't know if I've said this before, I kind of have a feeling I have but I will repeat myself haha. The one issue I've had for writing this fic is that I already had bits and pieces of the story all figured out. Look at the pieces like important scenes. SO I have these important scenes all spread out and no idea how to connect them, so must of my struggles writing have merely been me trying to connect these scenes. In all honesty this is one of the big "scenes", I've been trying hard for the chapters of my fic to all be important in their own way and if I'm allowed to boast a bit about it I would like to think that I have more or less been able to do so. BUT I'm sure you guys can tell some chapters are more important than others and this is chapter in particular happens to be one of them. Mainly because I've had it planned since long ago. Enough of this weird talk though, I hope you understand what I meant by all of this haha. In short, I'm happy to finally be posting this chapter! (Also I'm proud of the name, DID YOU NOTICE HOW ITS A PLAY ON WORDS?! IM SO CLEVER!)

**Electronic Ink 0: **I will admit that little extra chapter I just had to do no matter how bad it turned out. After all it only turned out to be like a few lines long. I'm glad you found it funny though. Also, yes to your question. **CortanTheOtaku: **This bit is for when you get here, I apologize about the deer, it had to be done, the whole chapter just had been tension since the beginning I needed Ruri to lighten things up. As always, thank you for your support!

You know I've come to realize something, it makes me laugh a bit but I don't know if it should. There's an..."amount" of nudity in my fic. Although is it really nudity if I don't go into detail? Either way funny enough though I've managed to make it PG-13 as fuck. (This is also funny cause I mention how tame nudity is and then say a bad word) (This is also probably only funny in my head) (IM SORRY PLS DONT UNFOLLOW MY STORY) Anyways, bad jokes aside, I've come to notice that yeah there's kind of a lot of "tame" nudity spread out throughout my fic. Just a thought, a weird one, but you know kind of realized when writing that part about the bathroom. That's all for today! As always, if you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Mettle"


	68. Chapter 68 - Mettle

**Chapter 68 - Mettle**

**September/3****rd****/2024**

**? Floor of Aincrad – ?**

**Esra**

I can't give up…

Breathing in deeply I move my head around, trying to find some relief as I find myself a little cramped. I move it around aimlessly and once I'm done ridding my neck of its stiffness I sigh. I more or less have the layout of the room I'm kept in down. My eyes are covered throughout the day, they've only uncover them when they are asking questions or beating me up. Both of those have a tendency to happen simultaneously. So in the brief time I'm allowed to look around I try to do my best and figure out where I am, all of this with the idea that I will find a way to rid myself of my bindings.

The room is roughly the size of an inn bedroom. Enough space to fit in a bed and probably some drawers but not much else, however it's nothing like and inn bedroom. It smells bad, it feels damp and I'm pretty sure I've been sitting over dirt for the last two days. The door leading in here is made out of wood, big and rectangular and about 8 feet away from me. The door has no doorknob or handle, but whenever they enter the room I can hear more than two locks being unlocked. If my hearing is to be trusted one of the locks is probably a bolt lock and the other involves a key, can't really make out the last one.

My hands are bound together and tied up to what I can only assume to be some kind of tube on the wall behind me, or at least it feels like a tube. It's cold and I can close my hands around it, sadly it's too sturdy to try anything. That doesn't stop me from trying to yank myself free from time to time. A part of me kind of thinks that maybe it will give in any second now.

I have been trying to wrap my head around the fact that both my arms and legs feel like they have been going numb. I've never experienced numbness in this world; I guess there's first for everything. Same goes for hunger, I have accustomed myself to eating almost every day and now that I haven't had anything for more than two days I can feel myself craving some food. Funny enough I don't hear my stomach growl. It's a weird clash between my thoughts and reality…this reality.

I grip the tube behind my head tightly and lift my body to change my position just slightly. There's also a constant dripping somewhere in the room, it's starting to annoy me. It doesn't help that my straining has only been getting better just from being locked up all alone in this room. I can hear drops of something splash against a little puddle all too clearly.

Drip. Drip. Drip…Drip.

I hear a bell ring and jerk my head up a bit, I probably got a message or something. I got one yesterday too, but they didn't let me check, then again it's not like I'm physically able to do so.

Drip…drip…

I've been reviewing what I did wrong, what I could've done to avoid getting captured. One thing is clear, I got ahead of myself. I convinced myself that I could take Klaus head on; clearly it didn't go as planned though. I should've been more careful, if only I had taken a look around before engaging him. If I did I would probably be back home, I would be safe. Then again, they would've probably searched for another target. Perhaps I can still swing this situation my way; they just have to make one mistake, that's all it takes.

"So what's it gonna be today?" I hear faintly past the door.

I make a freak attempt to stand up but I'm not even able to rise halfway as whatever I'm bound to pulls me down. If they are back that means they are going to hurt me again, I have to get away, I have to do something. The bolt lock slowly slides open.

"Same as before, it's all up to her," the deep voice belonging to PoH answers.

My hands tremble, despite this I wrap them around the tube and start pulling with all my strength. The thing doesn't even jiggle in the slightest. I hear my breathing becoming ragged, desperate. I can't keep my cool, and whatever remains of it is slowly wearing thin. I stop for a second as a try to think of something else, sadly I hear the second lock being unlocked which is followed by the last lock. In my moment of desperation I'm finally able to identify what the last lock is. It's another bolt, probably bigger, I feel dumb for not realizing any sooner. The door creaks open and I clench my teeth. Here it comes.

I brace myself, but even while I'm anticipating to get hit I cannot completely ready myself as something blunt and heavy strikes me above the head. I nearly bite into my tongue and groan as the hit leaves me a little woozy. I've been getting beaten up with the same thing for two days; it resembles some kind of metal bat. I feel my own breath escape my lungs as I'm struck right in the stomach. Normally I would appreciate my brain trying to assimilate this world as its reality. When eating food, sleeping and taking a bath it's great to think of this place as reality, it just makes the whole experience more likeable. When it comes to getting hurt though, it's quite the opposite. I can't remember what pain back in the real world feels like but these last two days make the pain in here come close to real one.

"You are getting just slightly better at guessing where it's coming from," I hear Klaus chuckle.

I'm not even done returning my head to its original position when I feel the blunt object hit me once more, this time it hits the front of my face. My nose feels like it's been pushed in just slightly, but I know that's not possible. However that doesn't stop it from…hurting. Hurting is the right word though…is it?

"Guess I spoke too soon," he adds.

They uncover my eyes and I blink a few times quickly to adjust my sight. Klaus stands close to me; he holds his weapon along with a big grin. Next to him is the actual brain of this whole situation. PoH the leader of Laughing Coffin, or whatever remains of it, which I've come to assume it's only these two.

"Look, young lady," PoH mutters as he bends his knees a little, "Same as yesterday, and the day before that. Give us some information on your friends and we'll dial back on making your life hell."

I press my lips tightly against each other and look to my left. I try distracting myself with the nearby wall. I can't think of a coherent reason as to why they would want to get any information out of me. If they were capable enough to get to me what is stopping them from going after everyone else?

I keep carefully scanning my surroundings, nothing pops up to me though. There's nothing at all within my reach and even if there was I can't do a single thing until I free my hands.

"Something like a schedule they all follow?" he asks, "Klaus here says that when he had someone inside your group you all had a pretty tight schedule. Anything like at all that you want to share with us?"

I remain silent.

I hear another drop of water splash in the corner of the room before having my head violently smacked to the right by Klaus. My health points drop a little. The weapon itself doesn't seem to be dealing a lot of damage, but the sensation is driving me mad. As if I got a massive headache every time I got hit in the head with it. Yesterday the beating lasted around an hour, after that they got bored only to return with knives. Surely things are only bound to get worse, but I'm not about to endanger everyone else just because I'm being tortured. No…it's going to take a whole lot more than that. After all, if I can manage to get through the first twenty hits or so it all goes so numb I can barely feel the ones that come next. All of this feeling within itself is some kind of false bravado, but I have to do something to keep myself from breaking.

Another drop falls.

I find some twisted safety in the fact that they choose to torture me. It means I still am of some use to them. It means they can't kill me even if they wanted to. In a way it's a bit of a relief that just means I have to endure it. Someone is bound to notice that I've been gone for more than a few days and start searching for me. Perhaps leaving the house the other day so abruptly was a bad idea though. Only Ruri more or less knows the reason why I left, and I can think of several ways that action itself could be interpreted as me wanting to be alone. Nothing is really ideal. I just have to tough it out. How hard can it be?

Klaus gets a bit closer to hit me better, I hear thud, after thud, after thud, my head buzzes for a few seconds after each hit. Feeling a little too comfortable Klaus takes a step forwards and I, feeling a little stupid kick his knee. Bending it to my will his upper body is now closer to the ground. Pulling myself up with my restraints I manage to raise my body enough to wrap my legs around Klaus' neck. I secure him in a weird kind of choke hold I've only seen in movies. Making a "four" shape with my legs I squeeze his head. As I expected PoH does nothing to help Klaus, he just stares as I start choking him. Klaus clasps his hands on my thighs, squeezing and clawing, doing his very best to get me to let go of him. As his nails dig in on my stockings I just squeeze tighter and tighter.

"Sadly, I can't let you do that, now can I?" PoH says, sounding annoyed.

He gets close to my face and for some dumb reason I try to reach for him with my hands, only to once again be reminded that I can't do anything with them. PoH takes his sweet time and gently wraps his hands around my neck, after he has a grip around he squeezes with incredible strength. His sudden hold is surprisingly strong, I gag at the moment he starts squeezing with his hands. The hold I have on Klaus is not great to begin with so if someone is going to run out of breath here it's going to be me. PoH stares at me as his hands keep tightening around my neck; I start breathing through my nose and breathe out with a lot of effort. His narrow brown eyes are fixated on my own, I struggle with the fact that what I'm staring at is clearly human, but what is staring back barely resembles one. My legs start losing strength as I reach my limit and I let go of Klaus. As soon as I do, PoH lets go of my neck and I desperately gasp for air. Coughing and spitting involuntarily, I'm just barely taking my second deep breath in when Klaus kicks my side. He follows up by pulling on my hair and slamming my head against the tube behind me. Unable to hide the unpleasant feeling any longer I wince and whimper. Trying to get him to back away I kick at him with my legs, desperately flailing them in his direction.

I shouldn't give up…

"You stupid fucking maid!" he screams and kicks my head.

"You know something…" Poh says, he lets out a soft laugh, "It baffles me I didn't think of this sooner."

Without explaining himself further he reaches behind me and unbinds my right hand. He takes hold of my wrist and forces me to do the downwards gesture to spawn my menu into existence. My eyes widen, I need to get more information, my eyes are darting around the menu, struggling to focus on its details. I need to know which floor I'm on, what time is it, something. Klaus covers my eyes again.

"No!" I bellow as I start kicking again.

I don't hit anything, my voice and movements at this point are just being generated out of desperation. PoH keeps forcing my hand through my menus. I feel the feedback over my fingertips as he goes through all the tabs.

"So you got messages from your lovely friends," PoH says, "How about we write back?"

"Don't you dare!" I scream.

I try to pull my hand back, away from his hold but he's too strong for me to do anything. I feel exposed and powerless. PoH is currently typing a message against my own will; on top of that he has access to everything I possess, every single weapon, contact and item.

"Let's tell him to meet you in the Wolf Plains," PoH says slowly, "He is to come alone, you have something personal to discuss."

"Stop!" I say, "What do you want from me?"

"Well if that question is solely directed at me, I think my answer would be quite simple," he says and pauses.

My finger glides through the air still typing down a message I have no intentions of sending.

"I want to break the will of your friends," he says, "Thanks to you, it will be quite an easy task. As for Klaus, I believe his urge to be purely focused on revenge."

"Get rid of all her weapons," Klaus says, "Get her Col as well."

"Revenge?" I ask, "What did we even do?"

"You bastards killed every single fucking person I ever knew in this damn game," Klaus says, "You can thank Aeri or whatever her name is. There was a point where I could've let all of this go, but your friend went out of her way to kill every single one of my friends, people I called my brothers and sisters, all gone!"

Hypocrite.

"So we are the bad guys?!" I exclaim.

"You tell me," he mutters, "I am not free of sin, but neither are you. Tell me how many people did you kill while trying to get to me?"

I think for a second and decide not to answer his question as the number in my head reaches double digits.

"That's right," Klaus mumbles, "You and your friends are all killers, no different than me."

"We are nothing like you!" I retort.

"You say that, young lady," PoH intrudes, "Yet…didn't you go out of your way to try and choke him just now?"

"It's different…I…"

PoH finishes sliding my hand and uncovers my eyes. I message directed to Al is now fully typed in front of me. It details to meet in the Wolf Plains at an abandoned wine cellar towards the west of the main settlement. It says I have something very important and personal to tell him regarding my thoughts about the guild. The message is eerily typed out in a manner much like my own. On the corner of my eye I see PoH grin as he forces my finger to hit the "send" button. I tense up, trying to at least make it so that he has to work for it. His struggle is barely notable and in a few seconds he is able to send the message. My heart leaps to my throat.

"Now let's make sure you don't get any funny ideas," PoH says.

He slams my hand against the wall behind me and I hear a loud metallic thud. I turn my head to see his Cleaver-like sword neatly stuck in the wall, cutting right at my wrist. I react poorly, I merely grunt as I stare at the weapon. He retrieves it to reveal I now have a stub for a hand.

"Let's get going, we have someone to meet," PoH says as he starts leaving the room.

I raise my arm close to my face and swing it front of me I realize I can't interact with my menu without fingers. Klaus laughs for a brief second and then turns his back on me. He follows PoH out, they let the door stay open and leave me alone. I turn my body and I'm finally able to see to what I have been bound to. My left hand is still tightly tied to a metal tube that runs up the wall. I instinctively make an attempt to undo de bindings with my other hand. I need fingers. I'm at my wits end.

I want to give up.

I fall to my knees and rest my forehead against the tube. They are going to kill him and it's all going to be because of me. I can't do anything, I'm useless, and I can't protect my master. I grind my teeth against each other and then bite into my left arm as I try to suppress the need to scream. Childish, but there's nothing else I can do. I stop biting and take notice of my arm. I bit down so hard there's a clear damage effect over my arm, a print of my teeth glows neatly over my skin. I take a look at left wrist and ponder what I'm going to do for a minute or so. I open my mouth just slightly and hear my teeth chattering against each other. I turn off any last trace of reasoning in my head and bite down on my left wrist. My teeth sink in just a little and feeling uncomfortable I push myself to bite harder. Like a blood starved animal I pull my head back and manage to take a chunk of my wrist as I do so.

I bite down again, and again, and again.

I spend fifteen minutes, maybe more practically cannibalizing myself. My wrist is now barely attached to my arm and pulling my body back in exhaustion detaches me from it. Both my arms now end in stubs with the red glow from the damage effect. I just now notice that my health is a bit below twenty five percent. I stand up and make my way to the door. I stumble a bit as I reach a flight of stairs that start as soon as you go through the door of the room.

I barely avoid falling on my face and step by step start heading up the stairs into a bright exit. I reach the top of the stairs and trip over some boxes. I fall on my back as I hear bottles clatter against each other. My eyes take a bit to adjust to the sunlight shining brightly on my face, the sky is clear and there's a strong wind. Just where am I?

I roll back on my stomach and struggling a bit manage to kneel, then I stand up. I look around only to see vast plains going as far as the edge of the floor. Something starts feeling off.

"No…" I huff, "No, no, no."

I take a few steps around hoping to find something or someone to clear my doubts about which floor I'm on. I kick a few of the bottle by accident and finally choose to look down. The box I tripped with was filled with wine bottles that are now scattered all across the ground. My knees wobble as I turn my head to the place I exited seconds ago. It's a small façade, the size of a door that strictly goes underground, a damn cellar. I let out a soft chuckle as I find myself unable to react in a proper manner.

"You figure it out yet?" I hear PoH's voice.

I turn around to find PoH standing next to a horse. Klaus is already on top of a horse of his own and shoots me a grin before he starts to leave the area.

"You are not going to kill him…are you?" I ask.

"No," PoH says, "Not today at least, he needs to suffer first."

"Break his will…" I mutter.

"All thanks to you," he answers.

He gets on his horse and takes out two small knives. Both of them are coated in fluid that I'm sadly too familiar with. One is poison, the other paralyzer, I can tell just by looking. I fall on my rear and feel tears roll down my face.

"I thought you would devise another strategy to free yourself other than maiming you other arm," he comments, "Tell me, if you still had one hand would you still have the will to fight?"

"If I did…" I mutter, "Would it change anything?"

"It's just disappointing," he says, "I thought you had this fighting spirit within you, I guess I was wrong."

"All it takes is one of those knives," I say, "And you obviously have more than a pair. It would wind down to how many of those I can dodge before getting hit. I have no weapons, no items."

"So?" he says.

"Even if I were willing to fight…I would just be buying time," I admit.

He nods and looks away in the distance. Another figure in horseback seems to be approaching us. It doesn't take long for me to recognize it, it's Master Al. I smile faintly, however I remain seated on the ground.

"How about we make a gamble of sorts?" PoH says suddenly.

"Huh?"

As I turn my head to look at him I see him throw one of the knives, hitting my left leg. The poison ailment status appears close to the one signaling that my hands are still regenerating. I'm expecting the other knife to hit me at any time, but instead I only hear his horse leaving and Master Al's growing louder as he gets close to me. My health drops below twenty three percent by the time he reaches me. The poison keeps depleting my health in a slow crawl.

There's a smile on his face once he sees me, unconsciously I wave at him, his eyes widen in shock. He jumps off his horse and rushes towards me.

"Esra, what the hell happened to your arms?!" he questions, "Who did this to you?"

"PoH," I mumble, "and Klaus…"

"What?!" he questions, "but…they are dead…or…or in prison."

I shake my head as my health drops below fifteen percent. He gets closer, close enough for the game to finally show him my health and status.

"Do you have…antidote crystals?" I ask in tears.

"Shit! I don't," he says, he takes a hold of my right arm and pulls me, "Come on, we can make it to the settle-"

I guess that was PoH's gamble. I chuckle and reach out for Master's arm, pushing him away from me. Merely being able to get him to unhand me I purse my lips and give him a wry smile for some reason.

"No, Esra, no!" he complains, he drops to his knees and grabs me from my shoulders, "No, you don't get to do this!"

My health drops below ten percent.

"Did I do a good job, Master?" I cry.

"What?" he asks confused.

"Did I do a good job…as a maid?" I ask.

"Esra..." he says, tearing up.

If I can hear him say it, maybe it won't all be too bad. I just need to hear him say it. I swallow my own spit as I start to sob.

My health drops below eight percent.

"Please…" I croak, "Did I do a good job?"

"The best…." he says, "but…you still have a lot of work to do! You…you can't leave yet…"

I smile and breathe in deeply.

"I'm glad to hear that," I sob.

My health drops below six percent.

I bow before Master Alshep losing all composure, crying loudly.

"Thank you!" I say, trying to sound happy about it.

My health drops below four percent.

I straighten up a bit and smile at my Master, my friend. The sight of him breaks my heart, he's crying and his face is overtaken by the most painful expression I've ever seen him display. It makes me so happy in a way, to think I was this important to someone. I take one last deep breath and look Alshep right in the eye.

"Thank you, for everything."

* * *

Crysina here!

Hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Once again DragonofAnnoth's revision will be applied once he sends them back, I was late to send him the chapter again...

This chapter is short and bitter on purpose. I can now say Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds is ten chapters or less away from coming to an end. Thank you all for your support and reviews, you've made all of this worth. Please stick with me until the end, after all, we are almost done.

**Electric Ink 0: **I believe you meant Esra? If not what the hell, I'm sure I can put Ruri in a maid cafe for kicks. **IC0:** I often find myself fantasizing of this story getting animated. I'll come clean now I already know what song I would use as an opening and what the opening animation would look like. (It kills me inside that it will never come to that). Also yeah you guessed right about misery looming in the horizon!

Short AN this week, got nothing else to say. As always if you like what you read please leave a review. If you don't you can also leave one, (It's not like I want a bad review but I just never gotten one, in an OC centered story it's kind of surprising to not see someone hating me for not getting the main characters in as much) EITHER WAY, I will see you all next week.

Next Chapter: "This Fucked-Up Wonderful World"


	69. Chapter 69-This Fucked-Up WonderfulWorld

**Chapter 69 – This Fucked-Up Wonderful World**

**September/3****rd****/2024**

**Forty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Hill of Memories**

**Aeri**

"Ah…" Sinna exclaims, "My hands are slipping…"

She struggles to carry a bag of pears, she makes a little jump in order to get a better grip, but it seems like she might drop the bag at any second. She is walking behind Elina, actually lagging behind her. I'm but a step or two away from her and will try to help her out if she is about to drop the bag. I keep thinking that if I try to help she will just get mad at me or something. I can't read her like I used to, and if my short experiences with her as of late mean anything I should still keep my distance.

"Eli, help…" she squirms.

I'm literally right behind her and she chooses to call out for Elina who is more than several feet away. I easily carry my bag of fruits under my right arm; from time to time I guess I forget Sinna is particularly small. In a way she shouldn't be having a problem carrying the bag. While she isn't the strongest of the group her strength stat should not be low enough for this to be a problem. However, the bag is rather big, so I guess the problem is more around that fact that she can't quite wrap her arms around it.

"Ask Aeri for help, she is closer to you," Elina replies.

I stare at Elina's back for a few seconds. I smile a bit but then I sourly part my lips to avoid doing so. In the last few days Eli has been sort of trying to help me out with Sinna. I appreciate what she is doing, but I feel uncomfortable. For one, I still can't spend any time alone with her, I feel awkward, embarrassed and just overall like a shitty person. I feel like she'll jump at me when given the chance, but it just never happens. It's hard for me to even begin to fathom that she has forgiven me. A feeling in the back of my head tells me that she hasn't, but I'm just too afraid to ask…too ashamed. A feeling in the back of my head also tells me that she never will forgive me, and not only does that make me feel bad, it also terrifies me. Why is it that relationships take so much time to build up? Yet you can fuck them up in a matter of seconds.

Sinna turns her head just enough for me to see her hesitant gaze. She tries to once again regain a better hold on her bag before sighing out loudly. It irks me a little, but I try to ignore it.

"Can you…" she starts, painfully she lets a few seconds go by, "Can you help me out?"

"Sure," I say with a smile.

I try to make the smile look as genuine as possible, but given the attitude I have to force it just a little. I get close to her and wrap my free arm around the bag. I easily carry her bag and my own and we resume our walk. The silence that stretches in-between us is almost painful. I can only hear our steps as we keep on our way back to Floria.

I absolutely hate this floor, so many flowers and absurdly cute things all around. Not to mention it also hides a darker side. It's kind of funny that the safest looking floor in all of Aincrad also happens to be the one that's the most ridden with vermin. This whole floor is a freaking paradise for red players. There are lots of places in little forests to ambush, lots of small towns without red player regulations. You can walk in and walk out no matter your cursor. The place where we are walking through itself is a freaking deathtrap. Compared to dungeons on other floors this happens to be one of the few that is out in the open. No walls, hallways, doors, stairs, or anything. It's just one vast open area with a lot of high leveled monsters. This means a lot of opportunities to Monster PK.

"Isn't…" Sinna struggles, "Isn't this quest kind of dumb?"

Completely lost in thought I shake my head and laugh awkwardly as I have no idea what the quest was about to begin with. I remember just tagging along cause I had nothing to do.

"Uh, what was it that we needed to do with this fruit?" I ask.

"We just have to get it back to the NPC," she explains, "It's just a dumb fetch quest."

"There's probably a nice item or something as a reward," I reply.

Sinna drags her menu down and selects the quest for more info. I feel myself smiling; this stale small talk between the two of us is the closest we've come to a regular conversation in a long while. I look at her as she stares at her menu, her expression changes to thoughtful to utterly annoyed in a matter of seconds.

"What is it?" I ask.

"I just checked what the reward is," she sighs.

"Is it that bad?"

"It's an item for sewing," she groans.

"Elina does like making clothes and stuff," I chuckle, "Remember when we had to kill like a hundred of those sheep looking things on floor thirty five just because Regi wanted a pair of pants?"

I breathe in deeply regretting my words and stiffen both my stance and gaze to look straight ahead. It probably isn't the smartest of ideas to bring something like that up so casually, yet I just did and in the most casual way possible. I don't even want to turn my head to look at her; she is probably looking at me with scorn. Her eyes narrowly staring me down, waiting for me to just even slightly turn to her to make sure I understand she is upset. I swallow my own spit and then hear her giggle. Immediately I turn around to see her covering her mouth trying to suppress the urge to laugh. It's too much for her and she starts laughing a bit loudly.

"And then," she snickers, "when we finally got the pants it turned out he didn't get the ones he was looking for."

I smile widely and get a bit closer to her.

"And then we did that other long quest," I start but also start laughing as I remember.

We look into each other's eyes and laugh some more.

"And the pants he wanted turned out to be girl pants!" we say together.

We laugh some more as we keep walking. Elina turns around to look at us with a smile, which immediately returns me to a more serious state. I clear my throat, but can no longer erase the smile over my dumb face.

"I still wear them sometimes," Sinna says, "they are like comfy pajama pants."

"That day was too funny," I mutter.

"I had almost forgotten about it," she says softly.

We keep walking alongside each other but it takes me a while to notice that she is crying. Even though tears slowly run down her cheeks, she still wears a bright smile. I want to drop everything I'm doing and hold her close, but I stop myself. What should I even do?

"I can't believe I almost forgot about that," she says, sounding disappointed.

"I have a lot of great memories with Regi," I say, fearing I might upset her.

"I do too," she snivels.

Looking back on happy memories after all that's happened is upsetting. If it is for me I think I can't even come close to understanding how much it is for Sinna. It gets you thinking about your mistakes, about your every action. I think the last thing I ever said to Reginald was very mean. I think we got into some kind of argument before I went out with Aereth to find Klaus. It pains me to think that the last exchange I had with him was one where we both were mad at each other. No one ever warns you that the cost of having happy moments in your life is missing them. Does Sinna think about this as well? Does it haunt her as much as it haunts me?

"Sinna," I mutter, "I know I can't make anyone come back."

She shoots me a bit of a standoff-ish glance, but I see more sadness in it than rejection.

"I don't want to make it sound like I want to excuse myself again…" I struggle, "What I'm trying to say…is…"

I can't seem to find the right words. I want to apologize, I want to tell her I miss talking to her, and I want to be able to look her in the eye again. The ideas, the words, they are all there in my head, but I can't execute them.

"Sinna, I…"

Elina comes to us with a hurried step; she looks worried and a bit desperate. I purse my lips as I feel interrupted, however it's not like I'm in the right position to get upset at Elina.

"What's wrong?" Sinna asks.

"There's a group of red players over there," she says and points behind her, "I think they are mugging those girls!"

A bit ahead of us I can see a group of three people slowly surrounding two girls. They are all branding their weapons, it takes a few seconds, but they quickly surround the two girls, leaving them no way to escape.

"Let's turn back!" Sinna huffs.

Sinna is about to turn tail when Elina stops her.

"No, we need to do something," she says.

"Do we…?" I ask.

"Yes," she answers with narrow eyes.

I set the bags of fruit on the floor and equip my gauntlets. Burning sensations spread through my stomach and face. I crack my knuckles and start walking towards the group of players. Getting closer I start seeing their cursors, the three players surrounding the girls are in fact red players. One carries a sword and shield, another a broadsword and the last player, a girl, carries a hammer. Should be easy I guess.

"Don't kill them!" Sinna says, "Uh…hmm…please."

Elina doesn't say a word or comments on what Elina just said. My only guess is that she would tell me the same. I take her silence as a second vote and keep approaching the players. Getting closer I can make out what they are saying. It's a standard stick up, standard to what I've seen Laughing Coffin or White Snakes do. They threaten to kill them if they don't give them their items and money. Normally after they would still kill them, so there's no harm in assuming these guys would do the same.

One of the girls getting mugged turns to me and her face brightens up.

"Please help us!" she begs.

She analyses me as I get closer and her hopeful expression turns into one of sorrow.

"It's just another one of them!" she whimpers and gets closer to her friends.

I sometimes forget that I have a different cursor over my head.

"Friend of yours Mozu?" the player with sword and shield asks.

"I don't have any other friends, dumbass," the girl with the hammer replies.

Trying to look cool she rests her weapon on the ground and rests her weight on it a little. The wind pushes her absurdly long purple hair in the air. I wonder for a second if the long hair is just some kind of aesthetic thing for the game or if maybe she does have such long hair back in the real world.

"Then who the hell is she?" the man with the broadsword questions.

"The hell if I know!" the girl replies sounding annoyed.

I look back for a second and see Elina and Sinna standing just where I left them. I breathe in deeply and look down at my iron-clad hands.

"Let them go," I mutter.

This "Mozu" girl begins to laugh. Her friends follow and the poor girls inside their little circle seem to be scared by this. They hug each other and with little steps they try to position themselves in a way so they are as far away from the red players as their little formation allows them to.

"This is totally a joke, right? Barush?" Mozu keeps laughing.

"I have no idea who this girl is," the man with sword and shield replies.

I don't like it when I'm not taken seriously. I start approaching the man with the broadsword. I need to give the girls an opening to escape.

"Hey, just who the hell do you think you are?!" the man says and swings his weapon at me.

I raise my left hand and grip the blade with it. The strength of the guy is so much it pushes a few feet in the direction of his swing, but I still manage to hang on. I close my right hand into a fist and with a skill strike the man's blade, breaking it in half. I let out a soft chuckle to myself.

"Are you seriously threatening people with toy swords?" I tease.

The man raises an eyebrow, looking pissed off. He flares his teeth at me and with a wicked smile I do the same. He throws a punch at me, I dodge it with a simple step back. I ready another skill punch the man under his jaw, delivering an uppercut. He stumbles back into the ground and I take the chance. I point at the two girls.

"You two, run, now."

Nodding like crazy they run in my direction, jumping over the man's body in the process. I hear the desperate steps sounding off behind me as they make their escape. Mozu gets visibly upset, I mean, why wouldn't she? If anything I just ruined her chance at getting money for lunch or something. The man I punched gets back on his feet tries to punch me again. This time I duck under his heavy arm and sweep him off his feet with a kick. He falls flat on his ass again and with desperate groans and grunts he gets back on his feet, quicker this time.

"Let's not do anything stupid alright?" I say, "I was told not to kill you guys."

Barush approaches me with a skill at the ready and feeling a bit annoyed I just stand still. He drives his sword clean through me and pulls it up to my chest. I see my health points drops just a tiny bit. Barush's eyes widen when he realizes his attack barely did any damage.

"You done?" I ask.

I take hold of his right arm and twist him to face away from me. I still feel his weapon piercing right through my stomach, but I continue. I pull his other arm behind him, finally forcing him to let go of his weapon and then kick him away. I take a look at my health and see it deplete just slightly only to recover before I can suffer more damage. I pull the sword out of my gut and throw it behind me.

"Are you guys below level fifty or something?" I ask.

"Let's get out of here, this girl is crazy," Mozu says.

"What about the money?" Barush asks.

"We'll pray on something else today," Mozu says, "This girl isn't worth it."

Mozu, Barush and the other man turn around and start leaving into the small patch of forest they came out of. I feel my hands and left eye twitch a little, it feels like I'm cut short. I need to do as Sinna asked though; I can't be lashing out, not now. I unequip the gauntlets and relax a little as the burning sensations disappear from over my body. The second I turn around one of the girls I helped is already holding my hands.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" she says with glee.

Her friend quickly catches up to her and wraps her arms around my neck, hugging me in a very personal manner.

"I thought we were going to die, thank you so much!"

"You are welcome," I say awkwardly, "You guys should be more careful though, this floor isn't particularly safe."

"We know!" the girls holding my hands says, "But we really had to get some items."

"We even heard of a group of red players that is known for mugging people," the other girl says, "We thought we could go by without meeting them."

"Wait you heard about them?" I ask, "How?"

Both girls finally stop their weird physical contact with me and take a step or two back to better explain themselves.

"We heard from some guys down in the pub that two men and a woman are known to mug people on this floor," one of them explains.

"The floor is huge, so we thought maybe we could get what we wanted without having to stumble with them."

Those three probably camp around inside the dungeon, waiting for players to come by so they can jump them. What a bunch of cowards.

The two girls give me a bit of col as compensation and then they leave. The joy in their faces for being saved is a bit weird to explain. Even more so because one of them confused me with someone that wanted to hurt them. It's no surprise though; the cursor above your head speaks volumes for anyone that doesn't really know you.

"Are you alright?" Sinna asks as she approaches me.

"Yeah…I think," I mumble and look down at the straight line of damage that goes from my stomach up to my chest, "I'm good."

Elina meets up with us and she seems a bit apologetic, yet another thing I'm not fully comfortable with. I can no longer tell if how I feel around her is purely because of my guilt or if I'm just overanalyzing things.

"Thanks, for doing that," she says softly, "I, uh…I now realized I kind of forced you, huh?"

"It's ok!" I practically yelp, "No one else was around, we had to do something, right?"

Elina nods and smiles at me.

"You are right," she answers.

I'm half expecting to hear another voice in the back of my head scolding me for not killing those guys but nothing happens. There's been no noise as of late. Just weak, overly blurry visions. It all feels to be winding down to a rest, but just when I think I'm done with an issue a new seems to arise. It's always been that way so I can't allow myself to bring my guard down, not for a second.

"Let's head back," Elina says, "I don't think we want to stick around for much longer."

Both Sinna and I agree with her. It doesn't take long for us to get back to Floria. Along the way I keep talking with Sinna a bit. It would appear my display of clean heroism has scored some points in my favor. We talk some more about silly memories we have of Regi, laughing as we follow Elina. After that we accompany her to get her sewing item. We get it as well since we also complete the quest. It seems like a simple sewing kit, but according to Elina's excited explanation it actually helps to sew high grade material together. There's no way for me to know what she actually means so I opt for giving it to her in case she ever needs a spare. After that we just take the teleport gate in Floria down to Barrowdell, which puts us less than a minute away from our home. I push the door to the guild house to be greeted by Ruri, who happens to be mopping the floor while wearing a black and white maid outfit with a skirt that in my opinion is a little too short. I guess Esra isn't back yet. Kayla is lying down on the couch as she seems to be reading a book of sorts.

"Welcome back!" Ruri says while striking a pose.

She sticks out her butt and bends her body over a little, moving her arm as to welcome us in.

"Wow!" Sinna says, "That uniform is super cute!"

"Heehee," Ruri giggles, "I know right?!"

"I don't know whether I should ask why you suddenly decided to clean the place or why you are wearing that outfit," I scoff.

"I will answer both!" she laughs.

Suddenly Kayla springs up from her comfortable position with a blushing face.

"This place was getting super dirty!" Ruri says, "And as for the thing I'm wearing, like a month back Kayla picked it out fo-"

"Shut up, shut up," Kayla squeaks as she covers her face with the book she is holding.

"I picked it out for myself, I mean," Ruri corrects herself, "Because I know Kayla likes to see me in pervy clothing."

Kayla slams the book against her own face and groaning she falls back on the couch. I laugh a little and head to the couch myself. I sit on the very end of it, over the armrest and try teasing Kayla by trying to get a look at her face. As I move my head she moves the book in order to not let me take a peek at those rosy cheeks of hers. I stop after a bit and just unwind in the living room next to her. I slip down in order to actually sit over the cushions and sigh. Ruri does a pretty god job at mopping the floor and the day seems to finally be winding down for a nice evening. I hear Sinna and Elina talk about something as they make their way up the stairs. I close my eyes and as I'm slowly breathing out through my nose the door slams open.

"Welcome ba-" Ruri stops.

I quickly stand up and turn to the entrance to see Al helping Esra walk in. She is crying, bawling like a little girl with no hope of being consoled. Taking a closer look I see that her hands are missing. Both of her arms end in a red glow.

"What happened?!" Ruri asks as she drops everything she is doing.

She runs to Al's aid and helps him by taking Esra off of him. I shake my head and run to help Ruri. Taking a look I notice her health stands at a meager two percent. We both offer a shoulder for her to move. She drags her feet, still unable to stop crying. She is repeating something in-between her cries but I can't quite make it out.

"They got me…wasn't careful…"

"What happened?" I ask softly, "Who did this to you?"

"Them, it was them…" she says

"Them?" Ruri asks, "What are you talking about?"

We take Esra to the couch which Kayla quickly frees up. We set her down and Ruri stays with her, I go around the couch feeling a knot in my throat. Al is hunching over the dinner table, his hands tightly closed into fists. With pure unadulterated rage he slams his fists over the table and with a bit of a struggle he flips it over.

"What happened?!" Elina asks as she makes her way down the stairs.

Still no response from Al.

"Geez Al!" I shout, "Tell us what the hell happened!"

"It was Klaus and PoH!" he fumes, "These past days that Esra has been miss-"

I can see his mouth moving, there's no way around the fact that he is speaking. He is speaking to me. He is probably explaining what happened.

"Hehe, I bet he is…" I hear a croaky voice say.

My shoulders get heavy, a weight settles over me getting heavier and heavier by the second. I even start struggling to draw breath in. I'm having a panic attack. No, this is something else, this is something much worse. Al's mouth keeps moving, he keeps uttering words I just can't hear.

"It's been a while…" the voice says, "It's been, oh, so very long."

A ringing sounds overlaps every single one of my senses, I want to grab my head and cover my ears, but I'm frozen solid. I can't seem to move. It won't stop. It won't stop.

"How about we go out and have some fun."

* * *

**Forty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Hill of Memories**

**Mozu**

"Keep that damn fire going, I'll be back with some food," Barush says loudly.

"You don't have to scream at me like that," I whine and poke the fire with a stick.

Soshu was kind enough to gather a lot of firewood, it's the only thing that idiot seems to be good at, carrying stuff. I chuckle and keep prodding the fire with my stick. I sometimes wonder why we bother to keep him with us; he is not even that good with a broadsword. I guess he is a friend though.

"Hey," I utter in Soshu's direction.

He is resting his head over a log, his arms behind his head, already snoring. I cannot understand how anyone is even able to sleep here. The only times I ever sleep is when my mind is just exhausted, I can literally go weeks without sleep.

"Hey, idiot," I exclaim.

He opens his eyes and turns his head a little.

"Really?" I ask, "You answer to idiot?"

"What do you want?" he asks.

"Do you have more of that liquor you shared with us yesterday?"

"Yeah, want some?" he offers.

"Yes, please," I answer with a grin.

He fumbles through his pockets for a while before pulling down his menu. He then searches around for a minute or so. I have a sudden urge to cringe as I see the state his inventory is in. I can't see a whole bunch as it's flipped for me, but his organization skills sure need a tune up. He finally finds what he is looking for and a long transparent glass bottle appears on his hand. It holds a turquoise liquid which I found out just yesterday it's the most delicious thing you can drink in this game. He tosses me the bottle and I catch it to appreciate and weep at the sight of it only being half full now.

"You need to go and get more, one of these days," I pout.

"It's really expensive, but sure I'll get some more soon," he answers, "Where the hell is Barush?"

"He said he was going out to get some food," I say.

"Guess we are having deer again, or something, huh?"

"It's not like there's a lot to hunt around here," I reply.

"True…"

I uncap the bottle and take a long swig from it. It taste just like a blueberry smoothie with just a tiny hint of booze, it's great. As I take the bottle away from my mouth I accidentally spill a little over myself. I cap the bottle and set it to the side just next to me.

"Ah, dammit," I mumble.

"She is here!" Barush screams, coming out from the darkened forest, seemingly out of breath, "She came back!"

"What? Who?" I ask.

Out from the shadows a figure all clad in a golden armor tackles Barush into the fire. A young girl with long black hair pushes his face into the fire. She is laughing as she does this. I spring up on my feet and take a hold of my hammer. Barush screams in discomfort and finally reacting I take a swing at the girl's head. My hammer connects with her skull and my attack manages to get her off Barush's back. I help him on his feet and see that half of his face is covered with a red glow, damage from the fire. He rubs his face frantically and not wasting another second he takes out his sword. The girl is still laughing as she recover from my attack, she stands up in a zombie-like manner and a blinding light envelop her hands for a few seconds. A set of red gauntlets I've seen earlier in the day now cover her hands and part of her forearms. She holds her own head and stops laughing to take in a deep breath. After she is done exhaling it she resumes with her laughter. She takes a few steps in our direction and the fire finally illuminates her face. It's the girl from earlier today, the one that stopped us from getting our money.

"It's that crazy girl," Soshu says.

"Yeah, no shit," I answer.

"Didn't she have red hair when we met her?" he asks.

"Of all the fucking things to focus on," Barush complains, "You focus on her damn hair?!"

"Yeah…hehe," the girl laughs, "That's a pretty stupid thing to focus on."

Dragging her feet and with twitching arms she keeps getting closer. She is a few feet from reaching me when she stops. She lifts her right arm and point at Barush.

"You, the one whose face I fucked up," she says, "How did that feel? I can't really say I've burned my face."

"What the fuck..." Barush mutter sunder his breath.

"I mean I'm just asking because I'm curious," she says, "Want to try it again? You know, so you get a hang of the feeling?"

The girls smiles in our direction, sending a shiver down my spine.

"I'll have you get a hang of this!" Barush screams.

He steps forward, shoving his shield in front of him. Once close he tries to stab the girl with his sword. The girl dodges his attack and with an even wider smirk she digs her own hands into her neck.

"Bloodlust!" she yells with an intimidating tone.

She goes for Barush's neck and easily lifts him off the ground with one hand. She proceeds to pull on his right arm with her free hand. With what seems like just a few tugs she manages to rip the limb from his body. She slams Barush against the ground and steps over his back.

"Do something, Soshu!" I command, my legs trembling with fear.

Soshu is slow to react and by the time he chooses to take a step forwards the psychotic girl has already ripped Barush's other arm. Pulling him from his hair she drags Barush over the fire and once again steps on his back, forcing his face into the fire. He screams as he burns, with no arms there's no way for him to escape the flames of the fire I was tending just seconds ago.

Soshu attacks the girl with a jumping strike, she just moves to the side as Soshu's attack is coming down and allows for his sword to stab Barush's back. The girl starts hunching over in laughter as she sees this.

"Did you just fucking stab your friend's back?!" she asks amidst her laughter.

Not waiting for an answer she pounces on Soshu, pushing him away from his weapon that is now pinning Barush to the fire. She topples Soshu on his back and she leisurely sit over his chest. My knees are still shaking.

"Now I'm going to try something," she says to Soshu, "Last time, I accidentally ripped a girl's head off. Hehe….ahahaha, but this time it's not gonna be an accident."

She clamps her claw-like hands on Soshu's head and starts pulling on it with savage strength. Looking past her I see Barush's body disappear over the fire and for a second the girl's face shines with what looks like scars. With one inhuman pull she rips Soshu's head off and I can see a bright light envelop her neck for a second. She turns her head to me and I'm able to see what look like burn marks all over her face. Yet she still grins under the scars, my knees buckle as I see the image of a girl smiling with flaring teeth as her face is covered with scars.

"So, what does it feel to watch as your friends die?" she asks as she tilts her head.

Second later she shakes her head and with a macabre chuckle takes two steps towards me.

"Nevermind that stupid question," she smiles, "I already know the answer to that."

"Why are you doing this?" I ask, "We didn't mug anyone! You stopped us!"

"You see, I think it's all about what you tried to do," she seethes, "When I stopped you, your friends tried to kill me."

I start crawling back, I stumble as I do since I try to keep an eye on the girl that is little by little drawing closer to me.

"I didn't attack you!" I scream, "Let me go! Please let me go!"

"You did just now…" she mumbles and then giggles, "You see, my head is still bouncing around. You have a strong arm, what was it? Mozu?"

I keep dragging myself back through the dirt, trying to distance myself from this killer as my legs don't want to respond. She laughs some more and drops to her knees, teasing me she starts crawling in my direction.

"Where are you going? Mo….zuuuu?" she says in a childish tone.

My own breathing becomes ragged, her face is crazy, it's scary. I need to get away. I feel her take a hold of my legs and I completely lose all of my composure. I start screaming for help in the middle of the forest. Hoping to god someone will hear me.

"You see, Mozu," she says softly as she keeps pulling me closer to her.

I feel her sharp claws dig into my legs, climbing higher and higher as she drags me close. Like a lioness trying to secure her pray.

"Please help!" I shout, "Someone please help me!"

I feel her dig into my stomach and pulling herself up, her other arm reaches up and she spreads her palm over my face. I feel my breathing bounce off her hand back to me and without warning she digs her nails into my face. I feel an excruciating pain as she uses my face to pull herself one more time. I feel her cradle her head next to my own, her laughter now sounding off right next to my ear. She stops abruptly and I hear her lick her own lips as she readies herself to speak once again.

"You should only try to kill someone, when you are ready to be killed."

* * *

Crysina here!

(Quick rant: I'm super mad cause the chapter's title is too long and now it looks weird on the chapter selection bar!) So it would seem a certain reader was able to see that I didn't exactly write Esra dying. Wasn't that an emotional moment? Props to you, you know who you are. YOU MANAGED TO SEE THROUGH ME! Anyways that's that so let's move on a bit.

**IC0:** Geez you make me blush. As I've said several times before to you and other readers. I'm so happy you find my work this moving it really both surprises me and makes me feel like this is all worth it. **Electronic Ink 0:** YOU MIND READER! On the upside, there's still hope for that maid café scene. **SkySlash9:** It's been so long since I last saw you review! And yes as you can see miserly is still in supply! **the13thmachete:** I'm glad to see you read up to the latest chapter!

Now, let's go to some news. You might already know what I'm going to talk about from my story's description. I want to take yet another break to be able to write more chapters without a deadline. Uni has been swamping me with work, actually as I was finishing proofreading this just this morning I was doing so while postponing a crap-load of work I have due for tomorrow haha… Either way I'll be back in two weeks, and will try to make some chapters. (Hopefully this time I will have more than one) I'm so sorry to anyone who reads this every Sunday, I know, I suck, but if I keep writing in this state I'm afraid the quality of chapters will drop. It is the third time if I remember correctly that I say I will go on a brief break. Trust me I apologize from the bottom of my heart. I hope all of you come back to read the new chapter on the 24th!

That's all for today, as always, if you like what you read please consider leaving a review! And if you managed to make it so far and haven't left a review, why not do so?! (Totally not begging for review) hahaha. Do as you want, don't worry. I will see you all soon! (Literally 40 views shy away from 200,000 views as I post this! :3)


	70. Chapter 70 - Regress

**Chapter 70 – Regress**

**September/21****st****/2024**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Steel &amp; Swords Guild House – City of Barrowdell**

**Alshep**

To say that things have been going smoothly as of late would be a lie, a big one. Everyone has been dodgy about going outside; I can't blame them for that, after what happened to Esra it's only natural to be terrified. Even when we thought we were safe we were crudely reminded that we aren't. Esra herself isn't over what happened to her, she's sort of gone back to the person she was when I first met her. Insecure, shy, and worst of all scared. She still tries to keep up with her activities as she did before, sadly she barely talks to anyone anymore and I've heard her cry more than once when she thinks she is alone. It breaks me to see her like that, she strong, she's brave…but I guess everyone's got a breaking point. I'm surprised I haven't reached mine; it scares me that I might be close though.

I turn on my side to see Elina lying just next to me, she probably still asleep. I find myself restless, just like in the past several days. I have been able to sleep, but it's been in short intervals and the dreams are everything but pleasant. I turn my body to lie down on my back and sigh. I close my eyes, hoping that I can get some more shut eye. I probably doze off for a few minutes as I'm awoken by Elina's voice.

"Are you going to sleep in today?"

"I'm awake," I mutter.

"You ok?"

"I…wouldn't say so, no," I mumble, "I'm restless, didn't get that much sleep."

I feel how she slowly settles the upper half of her body over my own, she rests her head on my chest and breathes in and out in a slow manner. It calms in a way that she is able to remain calm like this. I mean it's not like I'm hyperventilating, but I'm nowhere close to feeling relaxed.

"Yuuji…" she mutters.

"Yeah?"

"How long has it been?" she asks.

"Since what?" I ask, fearing what she might say.

How long has it been since what? Since my last mistake? An array of dumb possible answers to her question flood my mind. I know it's hard for Elina to hold a grudge, that much I have been able to witness. She has forgiven me for everything I've done, every single stupid thing I've ever done, she has somehow found a way to forgive me. I admire her for that. She is a much better person that I could ever hope to be.

"How long has it been since we got stuck in here?" she asks softly.

"In this game?" I question

She lifts her head ever so slightly and gives me a bit of a dejected stare, the type of look that easily asks a follow up question by itself, one that she quickly asks herself.

"What else could I mean?"

I'm an idiot.

"Two years? A bit less I think," I answer.

"Doesn't it feel like it's been way longer?"

"It kind of does," I admit.

I hear her stifle in her breathing for a second.

"I don't…" she pauses, her voice turning a bit pained, "I don't remember what Daath used to look like. Yuuji…does that make me a bad person?"

Am I really the one that should be passing judgment like that? I feel like answering just that, but thankfully I stop myself and reply with silence. As she finishes she hugs me tightly. I place my right arm around her and hold her close, gently patting her back as she calms back down.

I never really given it much thought. It's not like Daath's face is completely gone from my mind, however…it's been harder to remember as of late. I barely even remember what Kato used to look like. Both Regi and Owl are both slowly coming to a blur inside my head. I start reflecting on Elina's question. Does that make me a bad person?

"Try to think about something else," I say, trying to change the subject.

"Aeri…"

Well, in all honesty I expected the topic to change to anything but that in particular.

"What about her?" I reply cautiously.

"What you told me about her...the other day," she mumbles, "You think it's really alright you told me about stuff like those hallucinations she is having?"

"Well whether it was or wasn't, I told you I would tell you everything," I answer.

After all it was one of the few things Elina asked of me when making up. I would tell her everything that has happened and will keep her on the loop from now on. A kind of agreement I'm more than willing to uphold if it means that I can stay by her side.

"I just think maybe it was a bit too personal?" she ponders, "I don't think she would be ok with me knowing."

"Well…I already told you," I mutter a bit awkwardly.

We grow silent for a few minutes. Ultimately I sit up gently, moving Elina off of me.

"Going to check up on Esra again?" she asks.

I nod and stand up from the edge of the bed. I have been trying to talk to Esra ever since I barely managed to save her. It's been a rather hard task. She always seems to be busy and whenever I try to approach her she limits our interactions into short, awkward conversations.

"I just want her to go back to normal," I state.

"Alright, I'll be here," she says with a smile.

I walk over to the door, feeling heavy, I would like to be able to pin point why I feel like as of late. It would be just too easy to say that it's because of what has happened, but I know myself well enough to know it's more than that. Sadly, I'm yet to figure it out. I force myself to look back at Elina for a short second. Her eyes are fixed on me and once she notices I turn to her I can see her smile. I smile back and open the door.

I exit the room and the instant I do I can hear Esra's broom. It's so easy to identify, after all this time. The broom swishes and brushes loudly against the floor downstairs. I head for the stairs and slowly walk down, as I'm going through the first landing before the one where my room is I notice Billfray. He leans on the railing that overlooks the foyer. It feels as if he is keeping watch on Esra. Something that I find oddly fitting since Billfray is surprisingly imposing. Not as much as Aereth, but Billfray sure has an image that goes well with the whole "silently looking at things" action.

Instead of heading down to the ground floor I decide to approach Billfray. He turns his head towards me and then refocuses back on Esra. I get close on his right side and rest my arms over the railing, leaning over a little to look down as well. Esra is slowly making her through the floor, moving her arms just slightly as she cleans with her broom.

"This is worrying…" Billfray murmurs.

"Well…I am worried, but why this in particular?" I ask.

"This is the third time she's swept the ground floor this morning," he answers.

I believe my silence in this kind of situation is more than enough to express my reaction on the matter. Billfray nods and sighs out, sounding tired. Perhaps he's been out here more than I initially figured.

"I want to come up with the right words to approach her," he says, "It doesn't sit well with me to see her like this. I…I've just been staring though, can't come up with something to say, can't even force myself to stop her."

Just like Billfray, I lack words, but in this instance I lack the words to answer him. I lack the words to reassure him, to make him feel better. I feel like I have failed him for not having the right words. Then again I don't think it would be the first time.

We stare at Esra for a few minutes longer in complete and utter silence. Esra's broom becomes the only sound that can be heard across the house. It feels like the sound itself is growing louder, but it's merely because of the lack of another sound to contrast it.

"Do you ever go to sleep hoping you'll wake up to find yourself in a hospital?" Billfray asks, "To find out you finally made it out, that you managed to survive?"

I have never even thought about it. From time to time whenever I have nothing to keep me busy a similar thought does flood my mind, but it's different, way different. I start thinking about my unconscious body back in the real word and what is happening to it. How is my livelihood being sustained back there? What hospital am I in? Has someone visited me? Does someone other than my father care about me enough to do that? Even then, my father has never been the kind to care that much, after all I'm sure his work is keeping him plenty busy.

"Sometimes," I lie.

"I dream of it too sometimes, it's rather cruel," he mumbles, "I wake up to see my mother, she is happy to see me, some of my friends are there too, you know, stuff like that and then I wake up. I'm still here…trapped."

"It's just a matter of time," I answer.

There's really no way around it, the clearing parties and anyone contributing to the clearing effort has to keep pushing. I know we will, after all it's in human nature to keep pushing, progressing. So from my own point of view, it just boils down to time, we'll make it there, eventually.

"How long do you think people can keep waiting?" he asks, a bit of irritation in his tone.

He leaves to his room further down railing and I'm left alone. As my sight returns to Esra his words start to make painful sense. Her eyes almost look vacant as she sweeps around the floor. She looks almost robotic in the way she is working. If I needed to use one word to describe the mood she is giving off it would have to be exhausted.

I finally decide to make my way to the ground floor and approach Esra. She stops sweeping once I'm a step or two away from her and turns to me.

"Master," she says softly, "Can I help you with something?"

Usually those words would come along with a smile and a warm look, but now they aren't. Her lips are slightly pursed and the look on her face is one of worry and dread. I reach for the broom she is holding and with my left hand grab a hold of it just below her hands.

"How about you take a break?"

"I…I…" she stutters, "I need to clean...it needs to be clean."

Esra shortly after breaks into tears, surprisingly she keeps a good enough hold of herself that she is able to finally tell me all the things she didn't in the past few days. She tells me about finally being able to meet with her old Master. For a brief time the topic makes her smiles, she takes her time and I allow her to calmly reminisce about it. I know what this place and by extension her old master mean to her. Sadly, her smile doesn't stay on for long as she moves on to explain what really happened with PoH and Klaus. She keeps on droning about how she wasn't careful enough and about how it was stupid of her to do what she did. The conversation stretches out for so long that we both end up sitting on the couches near the entrance of the house.

"I should've escaped when I first saw Klaus, or…or message you for he-help," she says, "but I didn't…it was stupid of me."

"Come on, there's no way you could've kno-"

"There was! There was…I should've been more careful."

She keeps on lashing herself in the back with her own words, every single time I try to stop her or make her think otherwise she snaps back at me further stressing how dumb or stupid she was. She then starts explaining what they did to her. They constantly beat her across the day as they pressured her into giving information about the guild. A blind rage builds inside me as she tells me everything they did to her in excruciating detail.

"The message you received that day was-wasn't written by me," she explains, "They forced my hand into writing it, I…I thought they wanted to kill that day, but it was me who they wanted to kill."

She starts bawling and desperately drawing in air. Trying to make her at least feel a bit better I start looking around in my inventory for a handkerchief or something. I'm hastily looking through my items when Kayla walks in and sits next to Esra. Out of her pockets she takes handkerchief and hands it to Esra. Seconds later Ruri joins Kayla and Esra on the same couch and Esra continues talking.

"I tried everything to free myself after that," she says, "I had to cut off my other ha-hand to escape. It was after I managed to get out of that place that PoH told me his plans where to get to you through me. He said he wants to break your will. I still don't understand why he risked leaving me alive…he could've easily killed me, yet he…gambled the chance."

"What that bastard is gonna get is us breaking his face," Billfray bitterly comments behind me.

I turn my head quickly just to check and see him standing behind the couch where I'm taking my seat. Kayla and Ruri nod at Billfray's comment to which Esra reacts with withdrawn chuckle. She wipes the tears off her eyes and takes a few deep breaths. Elina joins me, sitting next to me and holds my hand.

"Aeri and Aereth were right behind me," she whispers, "Sinna is still sleeping."

Surely enough I see Aeri take her place behind Esra as she puts her hands on the back of the couch. Her recently recolored hair for some reason pops out even so I believe that's the color it used to have back in the day. Black. Having everyone here feels me with a weird hint of hope and happiness. Maybe it was Esra's crying what drew everyone out but the fact that we choose to stand together at a time like this makes me feel hopeful for some reason.

"I know probably all of you think it's stupid…or dumb, but…but I…" Esra stammers, "I'm so scared, I don't want to die, I don't want any of you to be hurt because of me or through me. I don't want to feel like that ever again. I have be-been having nightmares almost every night, I can't bear the thought…"

"That's not dumb dear," Kayla says, and holds Esra close, "It's alright, no one will hurt you again."

Kayla reminds me for a second of how she used to be like a long while ago. That noble and peaceful persona of her does tend to express itself from time to time and at a time like this it is certainly welcome.

I struggle to keep my composure as I watch Esra choke through her words though. It had been easy to tell that something was wrong, that she wasn't feeling well. I never thought it was this bad though. I simply cannot begin to understand what she went through, and as I see the expressions of everyone that has gathered around to hear Esra out I'm sure everyone is in the same situation as I am. I guess the fault in that is purely my own, I haven't taken the time to actually talk to her. I have been checking up on her, but I have consciously avoiding talking about what happened, not to mention I'm sure she has as well.

Just thinking about it pisses me off. It pisses me off for what they did to Esra, it pisses me off for what this could mean to our safety, but most importantly it pisses me off because once again we let our guard down.

"I'll keep you safe, I'll keep you all safe," I say firmly, "I promise."

Yet I feel like the words that come out of my mouth are empty. I have no way at all to come through with that promise. The only way I can think of even coming close to accomplishing that involves doing a lot of stuff Elina would not be ok with. What if that's the price?

"Master…" she chokes.

She reaches out to take hold of my hands and smiles.

"I know you will," she says with teary eyes.

All this faith in my person. Where does it even come from? I feel her hands squeeze my own and I feel the need to smile back. I cannot fail her, not again, not ever again. I won't fail anyone else again.

She slowly let's go of my hands and rests her back on the couch looking unbelievably tired. I guess talking about all of this had to take a toll on her. Kayla pats her back and for a second we all sigh out in unison.

I stand up and start pacing a bit aimlessly around. There's one thing I can try before throwing myself out there, but for that I'm going to need the help of a friend. My last hope before doing something extremely stupid.

"Aeri, message Asuna to meet us here," I say, "I have a favor to ask."

* * *

Waiting for something can be an easy or hard thing to do depending on the situation. If you are waiting for a movie to release the days go by painfully slow. However, if you are waiting for the period in school when you have an exam it feels almost as if the hours were compressed into seconds. This instance in particular is more like the former. Asuna has already arrived as a knock on the door would have us know and maybe less than an hour or so went by in between Aeri messaging her and Asuna and arriving, but for me at least it felt like more than a few hours passed before she arrived.

Esra without missing a beat heads for the door and opens it, she lets Asuna in just as I'm reaching the door myself. Once inside Asuna greets me with quick hug.

"I feel like it's been ages, since I last saw you," she says.

I feel somewhat happy to see her, what I'm not happy to see is another figure standing behind her. A man dressed in the colors of the KoB stands just behind her as he scans his surroundings thoroughly. The man looks rather aged as many wrinkles cover his face. In the past I've been amazed about seeing young players in this game, but I can't help it to be surprised that a man this old looking is playing this game. Esra is staring at him with cautious demeanor, her hand hovering over the options that would let the man in or lock him out.

"I would advise to let me in as well," the man demands.

"Well that's one way to say hi," I spit.

Asuna reaches for the back of her head and with an apologetic look scratches behind her ear.

"This man…is my uh…" Asuna stumbles, "security…detail?"

"He can be your boyfriend, I would rather we discuss what I was planning to in private," I huff.

"He is not!" Asuna yelps, "My…boyfriend…"

She awkwardly clears her throat and sighs out sounding pretty annoyed by the whole situation.

"Just let him in, alright?" she whispers, "I don't want him following him around as much as you probably don't want to let him in."

Doubting myself a bit I nod in Esra's direction and with a swift movement of her hand she allows the man to come inside our home. Getting a closer look at him I notice a few things. First of, he is rather tall, he stands just a bit taller than me and he keeps looking around the place as if it posed a threat. He wears the standard KoB uniform chest plate, greaves, boots and metal bracers all in that red and white color scheme. He also wears a cape, something I happen to find rather dumb. It's just a damn cape. What kind of advantages could it bring into battle?

"Who´s the old guy?" Ruri asks from afar.

"I am not old," the man replies a bit exasperated.

"His name is Kuradeel," Asuna sighs, "He is…my bodyguard."

"Damn they are going to such lengths with you, poster girl?" Aeri jokes as she approaches Asuna.

Asuna chuckles and greets Aeri just like she greeted me.

"I would rather not have someone following me around all day though," Asuna says.

"It's for your own safety," Kuradeel replies.

"Either way…"Asuna sighs, "What did you want to talk about?"

We all head for the table and take our seats, less than a minute later Esra is back from the kitchen with tea for our guests and us. Kuradeel stands behind Asuna as his eyes keep darting around my home. I wait for everyone to either have taken a seat or joined us in the ground floor. This time everyone in the guild house has come together even Sinna who just minutes ago woke up.

"Geez, you all look awfully serious," Asuna mutters.

We respond with silence and this makes Asuna's slightly joking attitude disappears completely.

"What happened?" she asks.

"Recently one of my guild members had an encounter with the leader of Laughing Coffin and another of its members," I explain.

"What?!" Asuna exclaims, "But we had that opera-"

"I know, I was certain myself that that would be the last we ever saw of them," I say, "Sadly I was wrong."

"Do you have any proof?" Kuradeel butts in.

I ignore him and just from the corner of my eye can see Kayla and Aeri shooting angry looks at the man. Not only does he barge in into our house, but he also runs his mouth with shit like that?

Unbelievable.

"I would rather not go into detail right now," I stress as I look in Kuradeel's direction, "But we need to do something about it, and I thought to come to you before I took my own measures. I need your help to find them."

"Wait…" Elina mumbles from my side, "What do you mean?"

"Please help us find these guys," Aeri says, "I know we've asked more than we are able to repay of you, but we are all in danger…"

"Guys, I…" Asuna mutters, "I'm not sure what I would even be able to do to help you…I could may-"

"The KoB cannot be sparing resources to look into allegations with no proof what so ever," Kuradeel says.

"I will fucking proof your face," Billfray huffs as he makes attempt to reach Kuradeel.

Aereth stops him by holding his arms and pulls him back to avoid any further problems. I can feel the air in the room getting heavy.

"You have some nerve," I say acidly.

"I have some nerve?" Kuradeel asks back, "You are asking one of the highest ranking players in the KoB, of all Aincrad, to help you out just because of some baseless allegation!"

I take my sight down to Asuna who is uncomfortably playing with her fingers. A pit in my stomach makes itself present as I'm sure part of her is agreeing with this piece of shit she is calling her body guard. I cannot entirely blame her for it though, she is in a rather important guild and resources should be focused on clearing floors not in some petty search of mine. However, I still want her to side with me, I want her to go above and beyond for me, for the time we've been friends. I want her to come through for all of us.

"Alshep…." Asuna mutters, "It's not that I don't believe you…"

"This is bullshit!" Kayla yells as she stands up from the table.

Ruri quickly follows her and tries to get her to calm down. Asuna immediately looks withdrawn by Kayla's reaction and her expression takes a bit of a sour tone.

"We cannot go around trying to solve every little problem," Kuradeel says, "Even more so when it's something as stupid as this! Laughing Coffin was wiped out and whatever remains of it is currently in prison. We have no reason other than to believe what you say is a lie!"

I'm a word or two from standing up and beating the guy to a pulp, but I keep my cool. He smirks at me and lets out a grim chuckle.

"Not that anything else should be expected from a guild that allows red players," he says.

"Hey, watch it," Aereth spits.

"Are you going to help us or not, Asuna?" Aeri asks.

Asuna refuses to look Aeri in the eye and slowly stands up from her chair.

"I'm sorry," she says, "I just can't, not at this moment."

She bows her head in front of us and takes a deep breath.

"Please forgive me," she says.

"It was worth a try," I answer calmly.

My tone makes Asuna spring up from her pose and her eyes look at me with an ashamed expression. I smile, not trying to appear smug, but quite the opposite, understanding and calm.

"Thanks for coming by," I say.

Asuna leaves quickly, I'm sure she isn't ok with her answer, but she already went with it. Kuradeel leaves promptly as well. He closes the door behind him and I stand up from my seat. Elina tugs at my arm harshly, making me face her.

"What did you mean by your own measures," she asks again.

"I'm not going to stand around and wait Elina," I reply, "I'm going after them. I will not allow anyone else to get hurt, I'll stop them before they can do anything."

She is about to give me a mouthful, but Aeri speaks first.

"I'm in," she says.

I smile.

"Glad to hear that," I answer.

"Me too," Kayla says

"Wait, but…" Ruri mutters.

Ruri has more than a few reasons to now be disagreeing with this, after what happened I'm sure she would rather let it all blow over but knowing Kayla she is not going to back down as easily. Kayla's eyes are practically on fire as she approaches me.

"We will end it ourselves, I'm tired of living in fear of these bastards," she says, "If you are going to go after them, you count me in, alright?!"

"Me too!" Ruri seconds her girlfriend.

"Me too," Aereth speaks.

"Aereth…" Sinna mumbles.

The people I least expected to back me up are already offering their aid, and I haven't even fully explained what it is that I intend to do.

"I'm in as well," Billfray says.

"M-me too!" Esra stammers.

"If everyone is going to help…I…I want to help too," Sinna says softly.

The poor girl sounds so unsure of her the decision that I'm almost about to tell her that she doesn't have to do it, but I see some resolve in her and the faster we do this, the faster this girl will be able to finally be safe. I need all the help I can get.

"Why?" Elina asks loudly, "Why are you guys going to force my hand?"

"I'm not going to," I say, fearing a bit of the possible outcomes of my words, "You can do as you want, I will not stand still any longer."

She appears taken back by my words as her eyes widen in surprise. This is the only way I will be able to ensure safety for all of us, and I have to act right away. Waiting any longer will only result in more of us getting hurt. The following path will not be easy…or safe for that matter, but I have to do it.

"I have to do this, Elina," I say and stretch my hand out to her, "Can I count with you as well?"

I see her slowly place her hand over my own and she takes a hold of it. She doesn't want to do this I'm sure, yet she is forcing herself to do so. I'm glad about it for some reason. I'm slowly becoming a twisted individual.

"I'm in…" she says.

* * *

Crysina here!

And we are back! I'm super glad to be updating today. This chapter I had fun writing, it felt tense all the way through for some reason for me. Maybe for you too but I feel like I accomplished something with this chapter. I'm not sure what but I like this chapter haha. Sorry I know that didn't make any sense at all. Also you guys are going to make me cry with all these heartfelt reviews.

**IC0: **To be honest I'm glad I can toy with your emotions, that means I'm doing something write (haha get it, puns). Also am I a worse person if I thoroughly enjoyed writing that scene at the end? **SkySlash9:** Oh there's a lot of fun ahead for psycho Aeri trust me. **Electronic Ink 0: **Nah I'm sorry, Aeri is Aeri and there's no nonsensical mumbojumbo other than NerveGear enhanced craziness. **Rydil: **Thank you so much for leaving a review! I'm so glad you like my story, hope I can keep you until the end of it! **OneTiredSloth: **I love your username haha. I'm so deeply moved that you think this way about my story. Thank you so much for reading and leaving a review! I will try to further minimize the typos I'm so sorry! **jtgamer-aza: **Your review is a few chapters back but nah you are a cool person ;) **Smuglehorn: **Hopefully I can keep making you feel the feels as we move on! Thank you so much for reading!

WHAT CAN I SAY?! I LOVE YOU GUYS. Thank you so much for the support, thank you so much for the reviews! I've said it several times before I'm sure, but I will say it again. Words cannot express what it means to me that you guys like this story, that you give it such high praise! I love every single one of you that comes by every Sunday to read my story. Thank you so much for deeming my writing worthy of your time and feelings! Thank you all so much!

That is all for this week, Uni is killing me and I have to sadly admit I was only able to craft this chapter alone. However we will be going back to our regular schedule as I'm two weeks from finishing this semester so I'm sure I'll be able to keep up! AS ALWAYS! If you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all next week!


	71. Chapter 71 - Odd One Out

**Chapter 71 – Odd One Out**

**October/8****th****/2024**

**Seventy Third Floor of Aincrad – Lockinge Town**

**Alshep**

"To be honest if you told me you got to feel absurdly badass I would've joined you sooner on this whole survey battle thing," Billfray says with a grin.

"What do you mean absurdly badass?" Aereth asks.

"We are like ordering people around and stuff," Billfray replies, "That's freaking awesome."

"This is a rather serious task though," Aereth huffs, "I don't think you should be playing around."

I lean forwards and rest my elbows over my legs. Lockinge happens to be the town that is closest to the labyrinth on this floor. Probably the smallest town I've ever visited, there's only about five houses and an inn. All of which look incredibly small. It does manage to have a small fountain in the middle of the place, which just happens to be the thing I'm sitting on. I take my time looking at the people who turned up for the survey battle, smaller turn up than usual. Then again it's not like people are exactly willing or excited to throw themselves into a dangerous situation.

"When is that other player supposed to arrive?" Billfray asks.

"Huh?" I utter, snapping out of my thoughts, "Oh, the Liberation Force said he should be here before we get started."

"So what's the deal with that?" Aereth asks, "Someway to keep an eye on us?"

"I would imagine so," I mutter, "I will admit my performance hasn't exactly been great on the last few battles I've lead."

"You would figure they would send someone from the KoB…" Billfray ponders.

"Yeah…but whatever," I say, "You guys keeping your eyes peeled, right?"

"Of course," Billfray says with a smile, "No black hooded bastard is escaping my sight."

"I still don't agree with this course of action, it's too dangerous," Aereth comments, "not to mention stupid."

"Well of course it is," I chuckle briefly.

It is completely stupid and dangerous there's really no way around it, but staying locked down at home won't do us any good either. However, I do think we've put some thought into it. The goal is to keep doing our thing, our thing being what we would regularly do. Act like nothing has happened at all. So for the time being, we will continue our survey fights, we will continue questing. For today in particular the girls are all together questing on lower floors while we decided to take up the task to go in and see what the boss of floor seventy three is all about.

"Honestly it's not us what's worrying me," Aereth admits.

"The gals will be fine," Billfray comments, "They are strong as hell, not to mention they can easily overpower anything with their numbers."

"Still…" Aereth sighs.

"It'll be fine," I second Billfray.

"You guys the leading party?" A feminine voice calls out.

I turn my head to notice a girl completely dressed in ALF gear from head to toe. She wears those bulky, gray-ish metal armors. All along with that cumbersome helmet obscuring what little you can make of her face above her lips, not to mention the odd resemblance to a Nervegear helmet. However, she does wear something that just slightly distinguishes her from all her jarhead friends, a red cape the slickly flows down her back. I've come to find out that the capes are given to important players in their guild.

I stand up and approach the girl. I stretch and yawn somewhat loudly as I approach her. She is rather short and if it weren't because I just clearly heard her girly voice I would figure she is just another dude in armor. Her thin, pink-ish lips are also kind of a dead giveaway.

"So the ALF sent you, huh?" I ask, "I was told they were sending a guy, no offense."

"Don't worry!" she says energetically, "but yeah, they sent me!"

"Well, you'll be working with us for today," I say and move to let Billfray and Aereth into her sight, "I know four people doesn't exactly make a full party, but no one else is willing to lead the charge."

"I see," she answers, "So…out of you three, who is Alshep?"

Well, this only further proves my theory. In all honesty I'm surprised this kind of player didn't come from the KoB, after all my main beef regarding these stupid battles is with Heathcliff not with Thinker. I'm about to raise my hand when I notice Billfray and Aereth already pointing their fingers at me.

So much for camaraderie.

"I was told to keep an eye on you," she smiles.

"Yeah, yeah," I huff, "We'll retreat if shit starts hitting the fan."

"Alright, I'll get all the other guys ready to go," says Billfray, probably sounding too excited.

"I'll go with him," Aereth says.

The labyrinth is not that far, a few minutes of walking should put us right at the entrance and according to earlier scouting parties the labyrinth itself doesn't have many strong enemies. Actually if the info gathered from the labyrinth scouting is to trust, one could say we are actually, for once, overpowered. Apparently the place is riddled with knights that according to very specific words "seem to not be willing to fight". I don't want to get my hopes up, getting to the labyrinth will be the only way to find out. So the faster we get going the faster we can get this done.

Billfray is rallying everyone up and I take my seat back on the edge of the fountain. I take another look at the girl from the ALF in front of me. What looks like a standard straight sword hangs from her hip. I sort of realize I'm staring, however she is as well.

"I didn't get your name," I mutter.

"Oh, right," she exclaims, "Name's Miku."

I roll the name around in my head as it sort of rings a bell, but I fail to place it on anyone I've ever met. I bring my menu down and send her a party invite. She quickly accepts it and her name is added below Billfray's in my HUD.

"Have we met before?" I ask.

"I can't say we have," she says, "I have heard a lot about you though, Despot."

"Despot? What?" I snap back, feeling very confused, "How come you've heard about me?"

"You don't know about your own nickname?" she asks, "Well, I know of you because you have been leading quite a few of the recent survey fights. The fights for the last several floors actually…if I'm not mistaken that is."

I nod.

"Wait what the hell is this Despot thing all about?" I press and stand back up.

"Well if I'm not mistaken your sword's name is something of the sorts right? A unique item, how do you expect people not to know about that?" she says, "but…sadly the nickname comes more from you letting a lot of people die on that gryphon thing on floor….uh…I forget the floor."

I want to scream at this girl for running her mouth like this, but I hardly think that snapping at her would help my already damaged reputation. I take a deep breath and set my hand over the pommel of my sword.

I never realized I would gain popularity this way. Even more so such a bad reputation, I'm surprised I didn't hear of it before now. Then again I guess you don't want to be calling someone a nickname if it entails something like that. Sounds more like a behind my back thing.

The clearing parties don't make that much fuzz about the players that fight these fights. The players that get famous are people like Asuna or Heathcliff who happen to be there once I give them all the info I can about the boss, but I guess you can also get sort of famous through shitty ways.

"What's your fighting style then?" I ask, changing the subject, "You know, so I can more or less get an idea of what I can expect once we jump head first into shit."

"Is your language this colorful all the time?" she asks.

"Haven't been in a good mood lately, so for now…" I pause, "yes."

She makes half a smile with what little I can see of her face and tilts her head a little. She breathes in deeply and a bright light envelops her right arm. A massive greatshield appears, one that she somewhat struggles to lift and then rests on the ground, making a loud thud.

"I'm more of a defensive fighter," she says, "I'm a wall, but I also pack quite the punch."

"A straight sword and a greatshield are sort of an odd combination…" I mutter.

"It gets the job done," she shrugs, "I'm not trying to look good, I want to get hit and not die and to hit stuff and for it to die."

I take a look at my own armor and sort of notice how I've been playing dress-up myself when it comes to armor. I could be using something bulkier and with more protection but I refuse to do so because I don't like how heavy armor feels. I've learned to parry and evade almost perfectly so I guess I can manage.

"And this baby is just impenetrable," she says.

The shield quite literally resembles a wall with its rectangular form. The face of the shield has a symbol that sort of looks like a tree with entwining branches that towards the ends seem to be on fire. It's unlike any shield I've ever seen.

"Where did you even get that?" I ask.

"I made it," she boasts, "some for this sword!"

She unsheathes her sword, presenting a slick, blue-ish blade with several markings on its side. It doesn't look too incredible but it's definitely different from your standard straight sword. Normally a cooler design means a better weapon, it's always like that in video games.

"What the hell are you doing in the front lines if you can make things like these?" I ask, my hand unconsciously moving towards the shield.

"Let's just say I just recently decided the smith life wasn't really for me," she says.

My hand finds itself tracing the edge of the shield, once I realize this I take my hand back and laugh awkwardly. Miku laughs and rests her right arm over her massive shield.

"So, what can I expect from you Despot?"

"I don't use a shield, so I move around a lot and go in to do heavy strikes," I answer, "So maybe I can pair up with you and I'll let Aereth and Billfray pair up with each other."

A shield that massive will definitely come in handy for the boss. No matter what kind of weapon or attacks it has, that shield of hers is probably more than able to block them.

"That way you can wail on whatever we find up there and then I switch in to protect you while your skills reset," she strategizes.

I raise an eyebrow as I feel a little smile creeping up my face.

"That's actually a good idea," I reply.

"The troops are rounded up sir," Billfray says with odd glee.

"You are enjoying this, aren't you?" Aereth mumbles.

"Hell yeah I am!" Billfray exclaims, "Check this out."

Billfray makes a dramatic turn on his feet and winds up facing the group of players behind him. About five other parties of players turn their sights to him as he lifts his right hand.

"Alright everyone!" he yells, "We are leaving!"

The players immediately start approaching Billfray.

"Wait! Nevermind!" he says, "We'll be leaving shortly though."

After that every single player stops and you can hear the annoyed mumbling of more than a few people.

"How can you not think this is awesome?" he asks Aereth.

"Whatever..." Aereth mumbles, "We leaving yet?"

"Actually yeah," I say, "Also, you'll be pairing up with Billfray in the fights."

Aereth nods and starts walking down the road that exits the town. He raises his hand and beckons everyone to follow him.

"We are leaving!" He yells.

"Hey!" Billfray whines as he catches up to him, "I wanted to say that!"

"Too slow," Aereth laughs.

Miku stores her greatshield back in her inventory and sheathes her sword before stretching her arms out a bit.

"Alright then!" she sings, "Let's do this, Despot!"

"Yeah…" I mutter, "Don't call me that."

We all head out of town following Aereth's lead and after less than ten minutes of walking we find ourselves at the entrance of the labyrinth. It's massive hole on one of the sides of the tower that leads to the next floor. It's the first entrance to a labyrinth to actually look like this, kind of uninspired. In past floors the entrances were hidden or the tower itself was accessed from a place other than its side. Right on the entrance four humanoid-like knights seem to be guarding the place. They are quite tall, taller than Aereth at least.

"Alright then," I huff and unsheathe my sword.

Billfray and Aereth stand next to me already branding their weapons. Aereth holds his spear with both hands and leans his weight over it a little as he rests the pole on the ground. Billfray wields his scythe with a big smile and drives the blade into the ground just in front of him, ready to pull himself towards the enemy. I hear a loud thud on my left and the dirt shakes just a little close to my left foot. Miku stands on my left with her shield and sword at the ready.

"Ready," Miku says.

"Ready, " Aereth follows.

"Ready," Billfray echoes.

"Let's see what those scouting parties where talking about," I huff, "Go!"

Billfray pulls himself forwards and practically launches himself at the closest knight thanks to his maneuver. Triggering the enemies guarding the entrance all four start approaching us in what looks like a straight line. I guess the AI in these guys isn't something to write home about. Aereth run forwards and jumps in the air as he approaches his target. I run and fixate my eyes on the third knight approaching us.

As I catch up with Billfray I see him dispatch the enemy quickly with less than three strikes. Billfray always tries to cut the head off anything that resembles a human so that alone lets him kill his target in just two strikes. Aiming for the head is always great for critical hits. Just in front of me I see Aereth land on his target's shoulders, he pulls his weapon up and with a single thrust he drives his spear clean through the knight's head, killing him instantly. I dash past him and raise my sword as I see the third knight readying and attack.

The idiot swings at me from the right and I swing at his sword from the left. Metal sings as our swords strike each other and completing my swing I manage to send his sword flying out of his hand. I open my left hand into a palm and strike his chest with all my strength, the blow tumbles him on his back and it's just a matter of driving my sword through his chest to kill him. I notice that the knight seems to be devoid of energy, as I push my blade through his skin he barely struggles. Feeling confident I retrieve my sword from the ground and see Miku run past me with some effort, almost dragging her shield behind her.

As she approaches the last knight she sheathes her sword and holds her shield with both hands, making it so she properly lifts it off the ground.

"What on earth is she do-" Aereth says.

Miku meets her opponent with a bash of her shield which sends the poor knight flying a couple of meters and into the labyrinth itself.

"That," Aereth says quickly, "she is doing that."

As the knight slowly tries to regain his footing Miku stands on top of him and bashes his head in with the underside of her greatshield. It takes more than five hits, but the knight practically puts no effort into stopping her attacks, like the other one did with my own.

The players behind us cheer as they approach us.

"This is going to be a piece of cake!" someone shouts.

"I bet we can kill that boss on our own!"

"Yeah! Let's do this!"

I sheathe my sword and peeking inside the labyrinth I'm greeted with the sight of more pathetic knights. Some are leaning against the walls, looking devoid of energy; others are straight up sitting on the floor with their heads hanging to the side.

"What the hell is up with these dudes?" I say.

"Maybe they are tired," Miku says and chuckles.

"It can't be this easy all the way to the top can it?" Billfray ponders.

* * *

"Well, all of this was super easy," Billfray says as he stands in front of a set of massive double doors.

"So, do we have any info on what's inside?" Miku asks as she sets her shield against the wall.

She slides down the wall and sits down on the floor. Aereth also rests his weapon against the wall and sits next to her. The rest of the players are also leisurely resting close to us, for some reason the distance themselves from the door, more than us at least. Either way, a break before opening the doors is always in order.

"Nope, scouting parties for the labyrinth never open the doors," I answer, "We are the ones that get the information, but if this whole labyrinth is anything to go by it's probably a knight of sorts. Whatever it is it's probably also as pathetic as his underlings."

"We should gather our thoughts and try to come up with some sort of strategy," Aereth says.

"Bleh!" Billfray sounds off, "What good will a strategy do if we don't even know what the hell is on the other side?"

"Good point," Miku chuckles.

"It's never a bad thing to be prepared," Aereth huffs.

"For what though?" Miku asks.

"Whatever is on the other side of the door?" Aereth replies.

"Oh…" Miku says, "And exactly what is on the other side?"

"I don't know…"

"Then how are you going to prepare?"

"Alright!" Aereth yells, "Point made! Geez…"

I laugh for a few seconds with Billfray and take a few sandwiches out of my inventory. I toss one to Billfray, one to Aereth and hold on to one myself. I'm about to close my menu up when I notice I have an extra one. I materialize it on my free hand and clear my throat.

"Miku," I huff, "Catch."

I throw the food before she has any time to look up, but thankfully after a few seconds of juggling it in the air she grabs a hold of it. She looks confused as she slowly unwraps her food and purses her lips.

"I don't eat that much," she confesses, "It all tastes the same."

Both Billfray and Aereth are now staring at me with big smug smiles. I smile as well and unwrap my sandwich.

"Well, you haven't been eating at the right places," I say as I take a bite.

Aereth, Billfray and I stop eating our food to see how Miku slowly takes a bite out of hers. Once she does her lips curl into a big smile and she immediately takes a huge bite out of the sandwich.

"What the hell is in this?!" she asks, "It's delicious, oh my god!"

"We just have a great cook at home," Billfray says.

"Hmm, " Aereth mumbles, "This door doesn't look like it opens…"

All four of us quickly turn our heads to the door and start taking a closer look at it. It looks like two massive slabs of stone. Scanning the edges of them I do notice there don't seem to be any hinges on the sides of it. It also lacks any sort of handle or some way to pull it open. Perhaps you push it in order to open it, but that doesn't explain the lack of hinges.

Billfray stand up and approaches the door as he holds a hand to his chin.

"Hmmm," he mutters, and lifts his right hand as he approaches the doors, "It does look very weird."

I'm taking another bite of my food when Billfray disappears from sight with a quick teleporting animation. I almost choke on my food, but mange to spit it out and stand up with lighting speed. I look around frantically just to see if anyone else noticed. The only ones that stand up right away and join my side are Miku and Aereth. They are already holding their gear, it doesn't surprise me that what they just saw made them panic.

"Did you guys also?" I ask out loud.

"You bet your ass…" Aereth comments as he stands up.

"Is he the kind to play pranks like this?" Miku asks.

"No," Aereth says, "He is not the kind to do stupid shit like that."

Miku slowly approaches the doors and when she is about three steps away she disappears out of sight just like Billfray did.

"I guess they aren't being teleported out of the Labyrinth…are they?" Aereth asks.

"Let's move," I huff and take a few long steps to the door.

In the blink of an eye I find myself in another room with a knight like figure that towers a few meters taller than myself, it's lunging at me with what looks like a gold coated claymore.

"Watch out!" I hear Billfray yell as he tackles me into the floor.

As soon as we both hit the ground we roll and quickly find our way back on our feet. Aereth appears out of thin air and just as he does the knight tries to attack him as well. Being quite agile he rolls backwards and with his spear he springs himself back on his feet. The knight stops his attack mid thrust and lifts his sword to rest it over his shoulder. I see about five health bars appear next to his figure and a name becomes visible.

-Adomorn, Usurper of Souls-

"Well this guy is certainly not lacking energy at all," Miku says as she stands next to me and Billfray.

"Not that I care about the games lore, but isn't fishy that everyone on the labyrinth was super weak? And that they looked all lame and tired?" Billfray mutters, "I don't know as if they lost their souls!"

"You know, it would've never crossed my mind," Aereth admits, "but hell, I'm not discarding it now…"

"So this guy is actually going to be a challenge?" Miku asks.

"I sure hope not…" I mutter.

She sets her greatshield in front of her and unsheathes her straight sword with her free hand. Billfray grabs his scythe with both hands and the blade of his weapons starts shining a bright red. Aereth lowers his stance and the tip of his spears starts shining as well. The knight is only breathing as he stares at us, waiting for us to make a move.

Adomorn wears a squared helm with two oval holes that leave his glowing blue eyes minimally exposed. As he breathes, gently moving his body up and down, his glowing eyes seem to leave some sort of afterimage that lingers for just a second or so. His chest is protected with layers of metal that resemble scales, it covers everything from his neck down to his groin, but there's a bit of neck line somewhat exposed where his chest plate and helm meet. His legs are guarded by a long skirt of chainmail that only leave his metal greaves and boots visible.

"Spread out around him," I whisper.

I start taking a few steps back as everyone else fans out and in a matter of painfully long seconds we surround Adomorn. The arena seems to be circular, there are no visible entrances or exits, it's just a massive circular room, lit up on the sides by torches. We all exchange nervous glances until I nod in everyone's direction. With that Billfray dashes forward ready to attack, Aereth follows him, raising his spear. I'm about to dash in as well when Adomorn grabs Billfray from his neck and as if he were some kind of flimsy thing tosses him to the side. Aereth still tries to go in for an attack; Adomorn meets him with the blunt side of his claymore and also sends Aereth flying across the room.

"How confident are you on that shield of yours?!" I ask Miku.

She nods and sheathes her sword; she holds her shield with both hands and runs around the knight to reach me.

"Stay close behind me!" she orders.

I nod and place my left hand on her shoulder as I ready a piercing skill on my sword with my right hand. She moves forwards faster than I expect her to, but moving my feet at her tempo I manage to stay just behind her and her wall of a shield. Adomorn sees us and swings with his sword from the left. Miku moves her shield to receive the strike head on and I lower my stance a little.

"Get ready!" she yells.

A loud metallic crash rings loudly all across the room as Miku manages to block the strike from hitting us completely.

"Switch!" she yells.

She moves out of the and allows Adomorn's sword to keep traveling, but I duck just under his swing and strike the side of his chest quickly with a powerful stab. With just that I drain about a quarter of his first health bar. He groans in pain and quickly takes another swing in my direction. I jump back but the sword manages to slash my chest and a bit of my arm. His attack is clearly more powerful than my own as he depletes ten percent of my health with just a small slash.

"Right," I laugh, "Miku! Pull all of his aggro, you'll be ok behind your shield!"

"Wait, what?!" she shrieks, "How am I supposed to aggro something a shield?"

"Just keep close to him!" Billfray yells as he gets back into battle with a slash.

With lighting speed he crosses to the other side of the knight, leaving another dent in his health.

"Watch out for overhead strike though!" Aereth says

"I didn't even agree to this!" Miku complains as she perfectly blocks yet another strike.

Aereth stands next to me, seemingly out of breath and raises his spears once again. The intervals between Adomorn striking Miku's shield start stretching out strike after strike as he seems to be losing his stamina.

"How long till you can use Downfall?" he asks.

"It's ready, but I don't want to waste it right now," I admit, "I will later, just let's keep chipping at his armor as long as we are able with normal skills."

Adomorn stops wailing on Miku and Billfray steps in to attack him a couple of times. The blade of his scythe shines brightly as he gracefully twists his body and weapon to land the strikes. As soon as Billfray is done, Aereth jumps in to give a flurry of stabs to Adomorn's backside.

"This is going to take a while, even if it has like five bars," Aereth says as he backs away, barely escaping an attack form the knight, "Don't think we are supposed to be fighting this thing alone! His armor is too strong."

Miku slams the knight's side with her shield to get his attention and jumps back as she gets ready to receive a couple more strikes.

"Well!" she groans as she stops a kick, "If this is even the boss for the floor all the other players are yet to follow us in here!"

"Wouldn't be surprised if they didn't even notice we left," I huff and jump forwards.

I adjust myself to slash at Adomorn's back and land close to it. I pull my right hand back and stab through, the armor on his front preventing me to stab further.

"Back's not well armored!" I yell.

I'm about to retreat a few steps back when Adomorn reaches for my legs without even turning his head. He clasps his abnormally large hand around my left leg and flings me to the wall with incredible ease. I feel as my head is the first part of my body to crash against the wall and I quickly meet the floor. I stand up, slowly as I feel just slightly woozy. I take a hold of my sword which landed close to me and make it shine brightly with a counter skill. It's time to do something really stupid.

I grab a potion out of my inventory and quickly down it as I regret not bringing crystals. There's usually a door to open in order to enter the boss room, and you can use the same door to leave if you wish to retreat, but in this current situation my lack of foresight leaves me and my partners without the means of leaving this fight safely.

"Miku!" I yell from afar, "Get him to wail on you with his sword again!"

I can only hope she heard me, I see Aereth and Billfray still waiting for the boss to focus on Miku before timing their attacks with caution. We are almost done with the first bar. I start running towards Miku. I see her raise her shield a little as she readies herself for more sword attacks. If I time the following skill correctly it should allow me to parry his sword no matter how large or heavy his attack is. Miku blocks a strike, then another, and another.

"Move out of the way!" I yell, "Billfray! Aereth! Get ready to attack!"

Miku throws herself flat on the floor and I jump in right in front of her. I see the golden sword approach me with a lot of speed, but swing my arm to meet his steel with my own. I hear a small chime seconds after I feel the impact of his sword on my weapon.

"Gotcha!" I yell and with ease overpower his swing thanks to the skill.

The counter leaves Adomorn exposed as he staggers back with a few steps. Billfray runs behind Adomorn and as he makes his run he turns his scythe to strike Adomorn's side along with his momentum. The attack makes him stumble around some more and Aereth rolls forward and out of his roll he cleanly stabs his spear through the thin line of exposed skin on the knight's neck. I move forward, close to Aereth and see him turn his head with a wide grin.

"Switch!" he says.

I can't help but to let a wide smug grin take over my face. As the system pulls me close to the boss I raise my sword over my head and make a small hop as I reach my target.

"Downfall!" I scream.

I slash down right on the knight's chest plate, as soon as my sword makes contact with it, the chest piece shatters, exposing the skin below.

"Switch me in!" I hear Miku shout.

My eyes dart around and to my sides but I'm unable to see her.

"Switch!" I yell and back away as I'm still not able to locate her.

"Sorry!" she exclaims as she pushes me away with her shield.

"She was right behind you!" Billfray says.

"I can see that!" I reply as I get up from the floor.

Miku bashes Adomorn with her greatshield head on, pushing him back a couple of feet. She than unsheathes her sword and leaving her shield behind she jumps to stab the whole length of her blade through the knight's bare chest. Once she lands on her feet she rolls to her shield and stands back a few steps. Aereth doesn't waste another second and throws his spear at the Boss' chest. His weapon however makes it clean through his body and comes out his back, doing massive damage.

I take a look at Adomorn's health bars and see that two bars are now depleted. I'm a bit surprised, but at the same time I know that cracking that shell of his is what allowed us to practically go through one and half bars of health within a matter of seconds.

"Alright!" Billfray huffs, "I'm going in!"

Billfray's scythe is just about to strike the bare chest of the boss when he kicks him into the floor. Adomorn then places his foot on top of Billfray's chest and raises his claymore above his head with just one hand. With the other he touches the blade of his weapon and out of nowhere the blade starts crackling with electricity.

"Billfray!" Aereth yells.

"I got this!" Billfray groans.

Somehow he manages to escape the boss's foot and runs away leaving his weapon behind. Out of his inventory he takes out a longsword and with an uncomfortable expression readies it with his left hand.

"What is it with this stupid hidden talent thing on bosses!" he complains, "It's like the most overused concept since freaking…hell, health bars!"

"Just a few more strikes to his chest and I'm sure he'll go down," I say, "Miku!"

"Yeah, yeah!" she answers and runs towards Adomorn.

The girl meets a now electrified claymore with little to no effort and by just adjusting her shield she is able to take no damage at all as she blocks all incoming damage. On the corner of my eye I see Aereth retrieving his spear and running back towards the boss. Billfray awkwardly raises his longsword and charges in as well.

They follow the same pattern as before and wait for Adomorn to slow down on his attack before they strike. I go in as well and carefully help them drain his health bars. We seem to have figured out what to do to avoid taking damage. We continue dancing through and around Adomorn's electric blade, taking turns to attack and finally reach the last half of his last bar.

The boss is groaning incoherently as his strike have become faster and with almost no drain on his stamina. We are no longer able to attack as he hasn't stopped attack Miku for a full minute.

"Anytime guys!" she yells.

"He is not stopping!" Billfray says.

"He is not going to…" Aereth mumbles.

"Alright then," I huff and run around to reach Miku.

It'll just take one more attack, I can take it. I'll end it right here. I start running right at Miku's back as she stands her ground strike after strike. As I'm getting closer I step out to the side and go right past her as Adomorn is finishing one of his swings. I point my sword towards his chest and watch him drive the whole length of his claymore right through my chest. I feel tingly, probably the electricity. I pay no attention to my health and only focus on reaching his chest with my blade. I feel the pommel of his claymore press right against my chest, but I keep pushing myself forward until my sword starts digging into his skin. I see my health going past half and I make a last push. Suddenly all pressure disappears and I fall to my knees. The claymore and knight have completely disappeared, shattering into tiny shards of light.

"Yeah!" Miku cheers.

I see her straight sword fall close to me as it was still stuck to Adomorn. I sheathe my blade and grab hers off the ground. As I stand up and look up I see a word that makes me feel great, and one that is definitely a first in the survey battles I've done.

-Congratulations!-

I turn around and see that Miku is already making her way to me. I grab the blade in order to point the pommel towards her so it's easy to grab.

"I believe this is yours," I smile.

She smiles as well and places her hand around the grip.

"Yes, it is."

Instead of pulling the blade away from me I feel her push it and I can do nothing to avoid having it pierce though my chest. She drops her shield and pulls me from my shoulder with her other hand, easily pushing more of her blade through me. I feel her damn blade slide through me with too much easy. I groan, feeling a bit pained and reach for her face as my hands find no other place to set themselves.

"What the hell?!" Aereth says, but he is a bit away from us, "Stop that!"

I start clawing at her helmet and with no other thing to do manage to pull it off. Long strands of blonde hair flow out of the helmet I remove as I toss it to the side. I see a girl with shiny red eyes staring at me with a wide grin as she begins to laugh. On the side of her cheek just below her eye I see a particular tattoo.

A skeleton hand poking out from inside a coffin, pushing the cover that stares back with a grinning, laughing face.

* * *

Crysina here!

I had way too much fun writing this chapter, I feel like the fight was really cool, you tell me! Also I wonder if any of you picked up on who the girl was from the begging. I did make mention of her several chapters ago, I agree, it was for one sentence and it seemed unimportant at the time. Still, I wonder if anyone did know something was up from the start, after all it is known Laughing Coffin went into hiding after the coalition. Several of them still providing info to PoH and what not. So if there's Kuradeel on KoB why not have someone on ALF. Either way let's move on.

**jtgamer-aza: **Si given how this chapter ends am I still a bad person or a worse one? Hahaha, rambling is permitted, I hope the wait for next week isn't that mortifying this time around. **OneTiredSloth: **Yeah! Kicking ass means cool boss fights! I will admit there was probably a little too much moping around in past chapters, I hope this makes up for it. **Electronic Ink 0:** Klaus will come in due time, don't you worry. **IC0: **I got no puns this week. Thanks for the break down of the chapter, I didn't get to think of it like that, but when you mentioned it, it made a lot of sense haha.

So this coming week is allegedly the last one for my semester, I say allegedly because the week after that is reserved for me going to classes for less than 30 minute sin order for the professors to finally tell me if I failed any of their classes. (Which I really hope isn't the case.) Be that as it may I will probably be playing Overwatch starting Tuesday since I got into the early open beta. So a few tests coming down the pipe next week I probably won't be studying for. Man, I sure have my priorities straight. Anyway, that's all for this week! As always if you like what you read leave a review! (Also how about leaving one if you never left one before, huh? #isthisbeggingformorereviews? #itkindofis) I will see you all next week!


	72. Chapter 72 - Guild Inquiries

**Chapter 72 – Guild Inquiries**

**October/9****th****/2024**

**First Floor of Aincrad - Black Iron Palace**

**Asuna**

"I have no need for a member of the KoB to be here," Kibaou scoffs, "Much less their damn poster girl."

I cross my arms and lean against the wall of the small room, ignoring the subleader of the ALF. I want to take a punt at hi dumb looking hair and soul patch but I restrain myself. I'm not in any position to be stepping out of line. I could be doing whatever I want were this the KoB headquarters but sadly I'm in ALF HQ.

"I'll have you know I'm more than required for this little thing you want to do," I answer, "Steel &amp; Swords was accepted into the frontlines under my request and recommendation. I will not allow you to conduct interrogation on its members without my supervision, let alone with your reputation."

"What does my reputation have to do with anything?!" he snaps back.

"Oh, geez, I don't know," I play dumb, "Maybe it has to do something along with the facts that you and your people bully other players with taxes and dumb stuff like that? Oh right, also because perhaps I heard something about you guys taxing children last week?!"

Kibaou looks away from me and scratches his orange hair with his right hand. He knows I'm right, there's always been something I didn't like about the ALF but as of recently I've only been hearing worse and worse from them. They think themselves to be some kind of absolute authority. They bully people around and half the other rumors are just too bad for me to even consider. I would believe them in a heartbeat, but first I would have to get some proof.

"Bottom line is, I'm staying here until you are through with it," I state, "And don't you think I don't have my eye on your groups exploring floor seventy four. I know all that frantic searching around isn't just to find the labyrinth."

"Well yeah, we are looking for those two that got away," he says, "The reports say they are both pretty skilled, one used to be a merc, a pretty efficient one at that, the other is practically a ghost the only thing that makes him stand out is that he is the only scythe user in the whole game."

Aereth and Billfray if my mind doesn't betray me, I didn't talk much with either of them, but from what I was told by Al and Aeri they are great people, it baffles me how things suddenly came down like this. Poor Al, he didn't deserve it. I shake my head and walk closer to Kibaou; he is slouching on a chair right in front of a metal table that has one other chair on the opposite side. It kind of scares me that the ALF has a room like this and for some reason my mind can't help but to think these are not going to be the first interrogations this room has seen.

"Did the other members come willingly?" I ask.

"Some of 'em…" he replies.

"Some of them?!" I ask as I slam the table with my left hand.

"Hey, it's not my fault two of them resisted and tried to run away," Kibaou mumbles, "If you ask me, that just proves there's something fishy here. Someone is guilty, and you and I are going to find out."

Kibaou stands up and heads for the door, he exits the room and leaves me alone for a minute or two. I pace around the room, anxiously, thinking of what to do next. I'm at a slight disadvantage if I want to help any of these guys out. Aeri is most likely one of the few that resisted, so the situation wouldn't be on her side, and with what happened to Al…

The door bursts open and Kibaou drags in a girl with beautiful blonde hair, tied up in a simple ponytail. She tries to break free but her hands are bound behind her, making it hard for her to even struggle. Kibaou sits her kind of forcefully on one of the chairs at the table and then walks around to sit in the chair opposite to her. It's once I see her big blue eyes that I finally recognize her, she's Kayla.

"What are you doing here?" she asks while looking in my direction,

"I'm here to make sure there's nothing unjust happening to you guys," I say.

"Aren't you a little late for that?" she says, "We went to you for help! And what did you do?"

"I…ah…" I struggle as I remember the events that transpired in their guild house.

"You looked the other way! What makes you think you are going to help us now?!"

Kibaou loudly clears his throat, forcing Kayla to concentrate her attention in him.

"Please state your name," Kibaou orders.

"What? You are going to record this?" Kayla growls.

"As a matter of fact," Kibaou huffs and sets a recording crystal over the table, "I am."

Kayla shoots the man a big smug grin and kicks the table with her feet. The crystal falls off from the table and just by adjusting her position on the chair she moves in order to crush the crystal with her foot, seconds after it crashes against the floor.

"Heh…" Kibaou chuckles and sets another crystal over the table, "State your name."

"Kayla," she groans.

"Where were you two days ago?" Kibaou asks.

"Let me see, it's just that I have so many things to do in this damn world, uhm…" Kayla teases, "What the hell does this have to do with anything?! Where's Al?!"

"Wait…you don't know?" I ask.

She quickly turns her head to me and gives me a fierce look.

"What do you mean?" she asks.

"I thought you knew, he…"

"That is not important right now," Kibaou interrupts me, "What where you doing two days ago?"

"I was questing on floor thirteen," Kayla spits, "Now, tell me what the hell is going on!"

"Two days ago a high ranking member of the ALF was murdered by a member of your guild," Kibaou explains, "As of right now, two of your guild members seem to be on the run, while the other…we'll get to that soon enough."

Kayla chuckles for a brief second and rolls her eyes.

"You seriously expect me to believe one of my friends killed a member of The Army?" Kayla laughs, "I mean, you guys are scum, but there's no way one of our own decided to take out the trash with you guys."

I haven't been briefed properly on the matter, but it seems a certain situation developed during the clearing of floor seventy three. Not only did the survey group managed to clear the boss on their own, but some kind of fight broke out between a member of the ALF and the three members of Steel and Swords. Having little to no detail on the matter the only version I'm given is that it would seem someone from Al's guild struck the final blow on the member of the ALF. I need to dig deeper on the matter, sadly I'm not in control right now.

"Well how do you explain the fact that your other two friends seem to be missing?" Kibaou presses, "Innocent people don't run."

"Come on, that is hardly a fair argument," I butt in, "What proof do you even have?"

"Eye witnesses, about ten of 'em," he replies.

I bite my lip and cross my arms again.

"Either way, are you hiding your friends that escaped?" Kibaou keeps interrogating, "Do you know where they are right now?"

"Even if I knew I wouldn't tell you shit soul patch," Kayla answers and sticks out her tongue at Kibaou.

I laugh under my breath and quickly cough to hide it. However, I can see Kibaou notice this as he glares at me, showing his teeth like some sort of angry dog. I look away, pretending I didn't laugh nor see his reaction when I get a notification in my menu.

Opening my messages I see the Heathcliff has approved my request for a small group of KoB members to be dispatched to my location. I'm sure the members of Steel and Swords are being held here against their will, and unless these interrogations prove something I'm going to make sure each and every one of them gets home before the day ends. Finally getting a bit of an edge on the situation I just have to wait now.

"Bring in the other one!" Kibaou yells.

The door opens again and in comes a girl with ashen colored hair and multicolored eyed. She is accompanied by two large members of the ALF but unlike Kayla she isn't bound by anything. She walks in out of her own volition and even smiles after she sees me.

"Ruri!" Kayla huffs as she turns around.

"Hiya!" the other girl replies with joy in her tone.

"And take this one back, she isn't cooperating," Kibaou says.

Shortly after bringing Ruri in the "guards" take hold of Kayla and drag start dragging her out of the room.

"You have to let us go!" Kayla demands, "You can't keep us here!"

"Don't worry," I say, "I'll make sure they let you all go."

"What?" Kibaou asks surprised.

"Heathcliff is sending members of the KoB here as we speak," I explain, "You will let these people go if they are found innocent."

Ruri sighs sounding deeply hurt and with a quick few steps slumps on the chair opposite of Kibaou.

"It's super sad that even now we don't have your support KoB lady," she whimpers.

"I'm just trying to help," I say.

"If you really were you wouldn't be waiting for them to find us innocent," she says bitterly, "We are innocent, they won't even tell us what happened."

Her sight slowly moves to concentrate on Kibaou and she chuckles.

"Heeeyy," she says, "No one told you soul patches went out of style like twenty years ago?"

After saying her bit she all out starts laughing to the point she has to stop and take a breath. Kibaou is clearly irritated by the comments on his facial hair and he is doing a bad job at hiding it. Still, he tries his best and manages and pretty irritated smile.

"Please state your name," he says.

"Ruri!" the girl says with energy, "I like taking long walks through the beach and trying on cute clothes! That one girl from before is my girlfriend and…uh, my eyes are funny. Oh! Once I caught a fish with my bare hand on Floor twenty three! I got a prize for tha-"

"Enough!" Kibaou says, "What were you doing two days ago?"

"Let's see…" Ruri says and leans over the table, "Ok, so I probably woke up on my bed…or was it on the floor? Either way, so I woke up and then I had breakfast, I think I had bacon and eggs…or was it left over curry?"

"Afternoon! What did you do in the afternoon?!" Kibaou huffs.

Seeing how we are on our second person of interest and getting a clear look at how Kibaou is handling the situation it is quite clear he did not have any kind of plan whatsoever. The way everything is unfolding just feels unorganized and not professional in the slightest.

"Oh, see, that's why you have to be a little more specific," Ruri laughs, "Let's see, I was questing on floor thirteen with the girls."

"Ok, that holds up," Kibaou utters to himself.

"You should at least tell her why you dragged all of her guild here," I comment.

"Yeah!" Ruri shouts, "I was planning on napping around my guild house today man! People make plans to do nothing you gotta respect that."

"Alright, alright," he sighs, "Two days ago we were told by several eyewitnesses that a member of your guild murdered a high ranking member of the ALF. A spear user and a scythe user fled the scene. Would you happen to know their whereabouts?"

"Ah, you guys are looking for Billfray and Aereth?" Ruri asks, "I guess that explains why I haven't heard of them since two days ago."

"Aha!" Kibaou yells as he stands up, "So they are on the run?!"

Ruri leans back on her chair, her expression pretty blank and unimpressed.

"Listen here buddy," she says softly, "I have no idea where they are, they haven't even contacted me."

One can easily see where their fellow guild members and people on their friend lists are located by going over to their friends tab. I'm sure every member of Steel and Swords knows where this other two are at the moment, but I also know they aren't going to put each other in any kind of danger. That is the one thing the members of LC managed to get right. None of them had other members as friends so it was practically impossible to force location info out of them. The lack of this understanding from Kibaou of the system itself only further reinforces my thoughts about him not planning this thing in the slightest.

"Ok then, I guess you got nothing as well," Kibaou sighs, "Leave the room then."

Kibaou keeps proving to be bad at the activity he is trying to perform. If it were me on his shoes I would be pressing the people I'm interrogating, not just asking one question and then backing off. He isn't smart, that much is easy to tell. Then again, half of the reputation he's gained goes hand in hand with the fact that he isn't very bright.

"Pleasure talking to you dude with spiky hair," Ruri says, "Good to see you standing there KoB lady."

The door opens and in come the two guards that dragged Kayla out.

"Kibaou!" one of them yelps, "The KoB is here, they are taking the other girl you finished talking to!"

"Yeah, you can thank this lovely lady," Kibaou answers as he gesture sin my direction, "Let them take the ones I finish talking with, even if they won't let us keep them here at the very least they can let me finish this investigation."

The guards nod and Ruri skips right past them as she hums a cheery tune.

"Any objections, poster girl?"

"None," I answer promptly, "I also want to figure out what happened in that boss room."

"Alright send the next one in," Kibaou orders.

Seconds later, the maid I know as Esra comes in. Her eyes seem distant as she takes a seat on the chair. Her whole demeanor is cold, it's almost like she isn't here.

"Please state your name," Kibaou repeats the process.

Esra stares directly at Kibaou but she doesn't utter a word. She keeps her hands on her lap over her pretty uniform and refuses to speak. Kibaou waits a little longer but to no avail; Esra still doesn't utter a word.

"Uh, please state your name," Kibaou repeats himself.

Esra turns her gaze to me.

"What am I doing here?" she asks me.

"The ALF thinks a member of your guild is responsible for the death of one of their own," I explain, "They believe Billfray, Aereth or Al to be responsible for it."

"As in…" Esra takes a second to think, "You guys think one of them killed someone from the ALF?"

"Exactly," Kibaou mutters.

"I know nothing of this," Esra states, "I haven't been in touch with Master or Billfray and Aereth for that matter."

"I see," I mumble, "I'm sure all of you will be able to go home today, we are just trying to understand what happened."

"Are there any further questions?" she asks.

"No," I answer quickly to not let Kibaou push her any further.

"I'll take my leave then," she says and stands up.

She opens the door and lets herself out of the room. If I'm not mistaken there should only be two more people left to "interrogate". Aeri is probably the other person that refused to come willingly; her temper is quite short after all. I stand corrected as I watch her come into the room walking, with no guards behind her. Once she sees me she runs over to me with a worried look.

"What did I do?" she asks.

"Nothing, at least I don't think so, why are you asking?" I reply.

"I…uh…nothing, nothing, what's goin-"

The door slams open to reveal the last member of Steel and Swords, Elina. She tries to force her way into the room despite a guard trying to hold her back and both of her hands being bound behind her back.

"Let me see him! Where is he?!" she demands.

"You guys can't handle a little girl?!" Kibaou complains.

"She is stronger than she seems!" the guard whines.

"Where's Al!" she screams.

I look over at Kibaou and for the first time in this whole exchange I actually expect him to come to the same conclusion as me. It's time to tell them about Al. Our eyes meet for a few seconds and he sighs.

"He's in the prison, just below us," Kibaou admits.

"What the hell is he doing there?" Aeri snaps.

"He is our main suspect," he replies.

"In what?" Aeri presses.

"In the murder of one member of my guild," Kibaou says, "Now if any of you can provide any useful information as to why three members of your guild would attack one of mine please freaking speak up!"

"Let me see him first," Elina demands.

"Yeah, I am not saying anything until I see him too!" Aeri seconds.

"Fine," Kibaou caves, "Follow me."

In a surprising turn of events Kibaou finds himself leading us to the cells below the Black Iron Palace. I don't know much about the prison system or how the ALF runs it, but a single, narrow entrance to the cells hardly seems like a good idea, let alone for the place to be guarded by only two people.

Once through the first flight of stairs we make our way through a darkened floor. Cells go from wall to wall inside of them you can see several other players, all of them with orange cursors over their heads. I feel a little sick in my stomach as I see the way these people are huddled up in their cells, they are keeping them like animals. We walk down another flight of stairs at the end of the room and reach yet another floor filled with cells. The cells aren't as crowded as in the first floor but you can still see two people per cell in some cases.

"He should be here," Kibaou says.

"Al!" Elina starts shouting.

"Eli!" A voice shouts back.

With that response we walk over to a cell on the far end of the room. Inside is Alshep, the leader of the guild known as Steel and Swords, and the only person with a green cursor over his head in the whole cell area. That means he did not kill another green player. This new discovery means a lot of things for me. First of all this could discard the idea of him delivering the final strike, however it could also mean that if he attacked someone it must've been purely in self-defense. There are a lot of things I'm sure Kibaou is not even taking into consideration, but I can't jump to conclusions. He happens to be one of the few people to have a cell all to himself. He reaches for the bars that separate him from freedom and pulls himself as close as he is able to.

Elina reaches inside and despite the all too solid bars separating them she hugs him. Al hugs back and I can see him relax, even in a situation like this.

"He refused to talk ever since the rest of the survey groups seized him," Kibaou explains, "The other two got away so we had no choice but to jail him here while we tried to get more info."

"You got it all wrong," Al says softly, "That girl, Miku; she was a member from Laughing Coffin. If you had one of those degenerates in your ranks there might be more!"

"Laughing Coffin was wiped out months ago!" Kibaou replies.

"No it wasn't!" Al protests, "They are still out there, and that girl was one of them! There might be more of them out there! They could be in your guilds!"

Al turns to me and moves inside his cell to get closer to me.

"Asuna! You have to believe me, it's like I told you back in our house," he says, "They are still out there!"

"We can't just jump on it Al," I say, "We need more proof."

He slams the bars from inside his cell and then rests his head against them.

"I don't have any damn proof!" he groans.

"Well then you are shit out of luck mate," Kibaou huffs, "Now, since you are talking I'm going to ask you something. Who killed Miku and why?"

Al stays silent but a few second later he starts laughing as he backs away from the cell bars. He stops moments later and clears his throat.

"I did, and I killed her because she was a member of Laughing Coffin."

* * *

Crysina here!

This criminally short chapter is brought to you by I finish my damn semester tomorrow and I'm pretty stressed!

I'm sort of kidding with that. I mean I am pretty stressed but this whole chapter is an idea I was planning on since long ago. It's something different, blatantly just writing from Asuna's POV to put y characters through her perspective, etc. Honestly I'm not personally happy of how it played out, but I hopefully got to play with your emotions but dancing around the fact of what really happened to Al. Either way, me finishing the semester tomorrow means I will be able to write a ton. Also on just a dumb side note I'm excited tot talk about I'll be flying to Dallas to attend the Hatsune Miku (Disclaimer, LC Miku has nothing to do with actual Hatsune Miku) concert on Saturday and OMG I'm bursting with excitement. Do not worry though there will be a chapter on Sunday and...and...we will surely be wrapping up this story in about month. *tears*

**IC0: **The music for Zesteria is just great overall haha. Can't wait for Berseria. **Electornic Ink 0: **Aw, I'm sorry that last little bit felt out of place. I will avoid something like that in the future. I apologize for this chapter as well as I'm not exactly thrilled about how it turned out. **OneTiredSloth: **TO be honest I hope I kept you on the edge of your seat towards the end of this chapter haha. **jtgamer-aza: **Sorry for making you wait yet another week, specially with a chapter as short as this.

Also there's this awesome user **kill3rdarren** who is apparently reviewing my whole fic from the start. I thought that was sort of cool, it's been ages since I got reviews for my first chapter haha. Just thought that was cool. That is all for this week, next one we'll be back in full gear and no more excuses from my end. As always if you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all next week!


	73. Chapter 73 - Chased Away

**Chapter 73 – Chased Away**

**October/21****st****/2024**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Thickwoods – Sylvie Inn**

**Aereth**

"You know what?" Billfray asks.

I roll my eyes and lean against the edge of the pool of hot water. The night happens to be a quiet one, but the fact that Billfray is still not over what happened more than a few weeks ago is making it a rowdy one.

"Let me guess…" I sigh, "You are going to say this whole thing is bullsh-"

"Bullshit, man!" he says, "I mean what a load of crap, I thought that Asuna girl was supposed to be on our side!"

"You complained about this yesterday…and the day before," I huff, "and the day before that…"

"Well, unless we get this sorted out I'm not going to talk about anything else," he says.

I make my hands into a small bowl and collect water from the pool. I wait a few seconds, staring into it for some reason. I sigh yet again and splash my face with the pleasant hot hater. I breathe in deeply and go back to resting my back against the edge.

"It's not going to be easy, it's going to be damn near impossible to get Al out of prison," I say.

"We don't have to do that," he replies.

"Huh?"

He turns a little to grab his mug of Ale which he set just next to him on the edge of the pool. He grabs it and takes a long swig out of it before reaching behind him once more and grabbing a skewer of shrimps which Sylvianna was kind enough to bring us.

"We just have to prove his innocence!" he says with a mouthful.

"And how do you suggest we do that?" I ask.

"We have to catch one of those Laughing Coffin bastards and get him to confess," he explains.

"Yeah, that's not exactly easy," I sigh, "If we don't have enough with those psychos going after us, Elina says now both the KoB and ALF are now actively searching for both of us."

Billfray stares at me, slowly munching on his food; however he appears to be deep in though. So deep in thought that if it weren't because I'm staring at his perplexed expression I wouldn't have noticed that he is probably chewing too much on his food.

"Wait, why did they wait so long to actively search for us?" he retorts, "And why the hell is the KoB on our tail now as well?"

"Beats me man, but apparently they've had some people looking for us since they got to AL," I sigh, "The thing is that right now there's more people searching for us..."

"Can't we just teleport to Barrowdell and make it home?"

"Didn't you read Aeri's last message?" I mutter, "There are dudes from the ALF outside our house since Al confessed. They are waiting for us like vultures."

I jerk my head a little bit as I hear some steps coming from behind. In a bit of paranoid break I turn my head quickly to see the owner of the inn approaching us. She meets my sudden reaction with a smile and keeps getting closer. I didn't interact much with her the first time we all got here, but even if she appears and acts all too much like a human I can't help but to still treat her like a computer program. I guess that is slightly the reason why I don't care for her coming into the bath while both Billfray and I are in it.

"Gentlemen," she sings, "I brought some more snacks and Aereth dear, I know you said you didn't want anything to drink, but I brought you a nice tall glass of ice cold milk tea, like you always asked me for the last time you stayed here."

Billfray chortles loudly and I'm able to see as some of his ale escape through his nose and mouth.

"Milk tea?" he asks, "That's like the girliest thing ever."

"Shut up, man," I growl, "I like it…it's sweet."

A bit reluctantly I take the tall glass of brownish liquid Sylvianna sets close to me and start sipping from it.

"Say, I hope I'm not being much of a bother for this, but may I ask a question?" the elf asks.

"You already did in that sentence…" I mutter to myself.

Billfray uses his shoulder to poke my sides and I involuntarily jerk my body as I try to ever so slightly shuffle away.

"Shoot, Sylvie!" Billfray says.

He's taken quite a liking to her, it's the first time Billfray is here and he finds it very amusing that Sylvianna is able to converse and act as if she weren't an NPC.

"I had such a grand time the last time you visited me, it was just so lively, and to see you come back with a new face makes me quite happy, but…" she pauses, "Are we expecting the rest of your friends? I miss them so. It's been a long while since I last saw Siren too."

I suddenly have a hard time at drinking any more of my tea. Part of me wonders why she doesn't know of her death, but at the same time I answer myself. Of course there's no way for her to find out, even if she is an NPC it's not like she is omnipotent.

"Oh…" Billfray mutters "You don't know…"

"Whatever do you mean?" she wonders.

Billfray looks at me, expecting me to take over. I set my drink to the side and stand up. I wrap my towel around my waist and run my hands through my hair to get rid of any excess water. Perhaps my thoughts start dwelling on a rather morbid area, but I find myself rather curious to see how a program will react to hearing about the death of a friend.

"Sylvianna…" I say softly, "Siren is dead, she was murdered eight months ago."

"You…you are surely joking…" she says with a bit of a laugh, "She is going to arrive later today isn't she? That is a bit of cruel joke, don't you think dear?"

"I'm afraid I'm not joking," I answer a bit flatly.

As I watch her carefree expression twist into one of pain and sadness I wish I could've expressed myself a bit better. She drops to her knees right at the very edge of the massive pool of water and covers her face with both of her hands. Soft cries escaping her being.

Billfray exits the pool and through his menu dresses himself in a flash. He quickly positions himself next to the crying elf and gently pats her back. Sylvianna reacts by quickly turning and embracing Billfray, after which she cries louder.

I put on some clothes through my menu as well and exit the steamy pool. I feel the need to also crouch down or something and try to console Sylvianna, but instead I walk away and head to the men's sleeping area. Like most of the issues I've ever face I run away, once again. I sit close to the small table in the middle of the room and slide my feet under it. There's a kettle in the middle of the table and next to it two small cups. I'm a bit farther away, but I can still hear Sylvianna crying.

A confusing array of thoughts enters my mind. For starters I can't seem to fathom the fact of an artificial intelligence mourning the death of something; much less I can't fathom the fact of something like that developing a bond.

My mind springs back to Twyla and her pet, Edelwiess, and for a brief moment it all makes perfect sense in my head.

"I'm such idiot…" I mutter to myself.

A few minutes go by and Billfray and Sylvianna join me at the table. The role Sylvianna would usually play seems to be reversed at the moment as Billfray serves her some tea and seems to be quite vigilant of anything she may need.

"I apologize," she cries, "This is no way to treat a guest."

"It's alright," Billfray answers quickly.

"I'm sorry, for saying it like that…" I mumble.

"Who murdered her?" she asks, "Who would do such a terrible thing?"

It doesn't take long to explain our current situation. It's not like we have to tell her what happened, but the way she is asking and her all too human expressions just make me open my mouth. Billfray explains how we've been hunted down by Laughing Coffin. He explains what happened to Siren, going so much into detail as telling her about Aeri's role in the whole scenario. Despite this Sylvianna doesn't seem to harbor any feeling towards Aeri, she is mostly heartbroken to hear about Siren's death.

"We are here in order to hide," I explain, "…just like last time."

"It's a bit hard to believe your guild leader finds himself jailed at the moment," she comments.

"It took us by surprise too," Billfray mutters, "It was tough enough to fight that Laughing Coffin girl on our own…"

"Shitty luck for us to have all the other players come in as Al dealt the last strike, maybe if we stayed, all three of us could've gotten away," I say, "He told us to run away though, to leave him behind…"

I slam the table with a close fist as I reflect on my actions. The scenario wasn't even that bad, if I disobeyed Al it could've been easy to escape. We could've gotten away even without hurting any of the other players.

"What are you going to do then?" Sylvianna asks, "You can't hide here forever."

Billfray and I don't generate a response to the Elf's sentence. Both of us stay quiet, I fear our silence is telling more than our words, silence can be deafening after all. As I'm about to open my mouth Billfray speaks.

"It's not like we want to hide…" he mutters, "At least, it's the last thing I want to do, but if we go out and try to do something right now it will only get worse."

"It's not like the ALF or the KoB have any reason to believe us…" I grimace, "Our word right now isn't worth anything."

"If I can help in anyway, please don't hesita-" Sylvianna stops halfway and her ears begin to twitch, "Excuse me, there's someone at the front. Please help yourselves in the common area, there's drinks and food, as always."

She stands up and quickly exits the men's area to head to the inn's entrance. I exchange a couple of awkward glances with Billfray and we both stand up to go to the common area as Sylvianna suggested.

"That was sort of awkward…" I mumble as we walk.

"How come?"

"Dude, isn't she like well you know…not real?" I say, "Hell, I don't know, I even feel like apologizing to her again but…should I? I'm so confused…"

"Come on, she is like a real person, just treat her like so," Billfray says.

"Sure…I guess," I mutter.

We reach the common area; in the middle of the big room is another table. Tons of food and drinks are set up for us to enjoy. I sit down and grab myself some food as I find myself quite hungry.

Sylvianna's food is great, sadly it isn't better than Esra's, but she makes a fine cook. This raises a lot of questions. Esra taught me that the trick behind cooking good tasting food here is by trying to recreate flavors of the real world in here. All of this is done through a tricky grid and rather unconventional means. Just how much knowledge does Sylvianna have from real world food?

A couple of footsteps start approaching from the entrance and in a matter of seconds we see a man and a woman, their arms linked, getting closer with big bright smiles on their faces, a couple. The man looks quite rugged, brownish short hair and several scars across his face. I wonder if they are purely cosmetic items or if he had those before entering the game. The woman on the other hand gives off a mysterious vibe, her long pink-ish hair is arranged in a way that covers half of her face. It is clear that the way she styles her hair is more than intentional given how despite half of her features being hidden the side of her face that is visible is highlighted by her use of makeup both around her eyes and on her lips. I would be ok if anyone from the guild decided to stop by, but given they are literally being guarded in case we appear, it might not be the best of ideas, the last thing I need is a couple of strangers.

"I thought we wouldn't run into anyone here," Billfray mumbles.

"Me too…" I grunt.

"Oh my!" the woman approaching us exclaims, "It's so weird to run into people here."

"This inn is very hidden," the man says, "It is quite surprising sweetie."

I avoid rolling my eyes at these strangers' comments. I don't particularly like it when strangers make comments like that. It is clear they are referring to both Billfray and I, but the way they speak it's like they are barely acknowledging our existence. We are just damn pointers to their conversation.

They take a seat on the floor, exactly opposite from me and Billfray. They still manage to keep each other close, holding hands, arms linked, a little too clingy.

"So, I guess you've been here before?" Billfray asks the couple.

"Yeah, like a hundred times!" answers the woman.

Billfray does tend to be very talkative even with strangers, but at this point in time, conversation with people that I don't even know is the last thing I want to deal with. Trying to ignore their conversation I pull down my menu and start checking my messages, just to see if Sinna finally got back to me on the message I sent her this morning.

"We just absolutely love this place," the man says with a little too much enthusiasm.

"It's great, the baths are awesome," Billfray adds.

I'm sure I'm making quite the frown, but it's just because I'm not in the mood to be around this kind of talk, maybe I could add a little because of the fact that Sinna didn't actually get back to me. Taking a look at Billfray I can see he is somewhat invested on the conversation he is having with the couple.

"I really need to go apologize or something," I mumble.

I do so quietly as I only want Billfray to hear me. He nods quickly in my direction and I stand up. I nod politely in the couple's direction and make my way down the hallway that leads to the entrance of the inn. Once I make it to the little lobby I see Sylvianna sulking over the tall desk that acts as her check in counter. Behind the counter she keeps the robes for the guests and any other small amenities she is ready to give us once we step in.

Her ears twitch in a funny way and she immediately sits up straight. She turns to me with a smile and tilts her head a little.

"How can I be of service?" she asks.

"I wanted to apologize…" I say awkwardly.

"You already did," she says with a reassuring tone, "there isn't even something for you to apologize for anyways…those who should be sorry are the one who took Siren's life."

I swallow my own spit and cough a bit to clear my own throat.

"Still," I say, "I should've let you know another way, I think I was too harsh about it."

She giggles and leans over the counter a bit, resting her head on her hand. She smiles again.

"I believe there is nothing gentle about death, let alone murder," she says, "So please, you have nothing to apologize for, I truly mean it."

"Alright then," I huff and scratch the back of my head, "It just sort of…it hit me to see you react the way you did."

I consciously avoid calling out the fact that she isn't real or the idea that I find it weird that she can react so humanly to something like Siren's death. It baffles me that she is able to display such human emotions that I believe are just that…human.

"I just wish I could've done something," she says softly, "perhaps there was something that could've been done to avoid her demise."

"It just happened without any of us knowing," I admit, "I also wish I could've done something about it."

Her head springs up suddenly as if she had remembered something. She smiles and crouches behind the counter. I can hear her moving stuff around as if she were rummaging around for something.

"You know," she mumbles as she keeps looking though stuff, "I was saving something for when I got to a hundred unique guests here, those last two that just came in leave me at ninety nine, but I figure there is no harm in drinking a little right now."

She stands up from behind the counter and places a fancy looking bottle of liquor over the table. The long, slick looking bottle is sealed with a simple cork. I'm kind of smiling at the fact that this AI is about to invite a drink of her fancy stash when something she said earlier slaps me over the back of my head

"Wait, those last two people were guest number ninety eight and ninety nine?" I ask.

She appears puzzled as she is trying to yank the cork off the bottle with her teeth.

"Well yeshh," she mouths with half a cork in her mouth, "Those two are firsht timers here."

I tense up as I start to realize something is amiss. The sound I hear after only puts me further on edge.

"Aereth!" I hear Billfray scream.

I turn my head and lock my eyes with Sylvianna's, she is staring at me with wide eyes, her ears pointing up in an upwards direction.

"You stay here," I say, trying to appear calm, "It's probably just something dumb."

I walk calmly my first steps down the hallway, but when I'm five or six steps away from Sylvianna I start running to the common area. Once I step into the room where I was sitting just a few minutes ago, I do so to see the table with all the food and drinks has been flipped over. Liquid and multiple snacks and food are now covering the floor and even parts of the wall.

"Aereth, over here!" I hear Billfray calling me out once more.

I look past the room and see Billfray fending off the couple that arrived looking all clingy. He jumps back and makes a long swipe at both players, missing by a few inches.

Without thinking I have already materialized my spear into my hand and I'm making my way through the mess of food in the common area. I jump from the edge of the room out into the courtyard and ready a skill on my spear and approach the man with the battle-scarred face.

I try not to make a sound, but perhaps my own feet are a little loud because as I'm about to drive my spear through him he turns around with a an axe the size of my head and just barely parries the tip of my spear away from him. I use my own momentum to go past him and roll forwards and back on my feet to place myself next to Billfray.

"Please tell me these dudes are ALF or something," I grunt.

"I wish they were," Billfray replies.

The man takes a few steps back to join the woman he came with and rests his weapon over his shoulder. The woman gets closer to the man and pecks him at the cheek with her lips before going back to a battle stance, one of her hands at the handle of her Katana and the other firmly taking a hold of the sheathe.

"We'll spare you the trouble, idiots," the man huffs.

"Let's just say that both the KoB and ALF want you alive," the woman adds.

"We don't," they say in unison.

"LC then," Billfray says.

"Wonderful," I groan.

The woman quickly zips towards me, unsheathing her katana with incredible speed, a blow I only slightly manage to redirect with the pole of my spear. Billfray quickly aids me by kicking the woman away from me, but her partner doesn't hesitate either by swinging at Billfay with his axe. Slowly taking steps back Billfray parries every single one of the axe attacks despite the disadvantage his scythe brings when needing to bare his steel against someone else's. Parrying with a scythe requires him to distance himself in order for his swing to meet his attackers.

I'm trying to locate the katana wielder when I feel my leg give in a little. I look down at my leg and notice a shiny red line carved across it, right to my left side I see the woman wearing a wide smirk as she sheathes her weapon. My health points didn't take that much of a hit, but if she lands another strike like that she is sure to cut my leg clean off. In the corner of my eye I see Billfray handling the other man, he is not exactly winning but at the very least he is keeping him at bay. Breathing in slowly I point my weapon at the woman and starting walking in a circle around her.

"What did you little puppies do to get PoH so pissed off anyways?" the woman asks, not breaking eye contact with me.

I cannot understand why this woman thinks I'm going to reply to her. Right now all of my focus is dumped on analyzing her. Her stance, her grip on her weapon, I need to take a real long look at her, anticipate her.

"Aereth, watch out!"

I turn around spastically only to receive an axe with my chest. I grunt slightly at the weird pain and watch as the man struggles a little bit to retrieve his weapon from my body. I'm stumbling back as I try to move away when I feel another sharp sensation in my stomach. The woman is driving the length of her blade through my stomach, sadly I'm struggling to do something about it. The man finally yanks his axes off of me and I take the chance to stab him a few times with my spear, he backs away and Billfray slashes at him successfully dealing damage as well.

I feel as the woman slides her blade out of me and before I have time to turn around and get a few hits in she is already more than a few steps away from me. She laughs at me, I narrow my eyes, feeling irritated. I charge at her and both swing and thrust my weapon at her. With her katana she is able to quickly meet my weapon, parrying every single strike I throw at her. As I keep throwing attacks at her I analyze the way she parries, she anticipates my attacks too much, by the time I start swinging she is already swinging in my direction. I smile briefly.

I jump back and grab the pole of my spear with both hands and swings at the woman, her weapon is about to meet mine when I let go of it, this allows my spear to fall just a few inches under her swing and once she clears my spear I grab it once again and step in to stab her right in the chest. She grunts and I take her brief moment of surprise to push my weapon further in.

"Why are you four fighting in my courtyard?!" Sylvianna yells from the edge of the common area.

"They started attacking us!" Billfray replies as he dodges his attackers axe.

I feel kind of illuminated as Sylvianna appears in the scene, I get an idea I might regret, but there's nothing to lose at this point other than my own life.

"Sylvianna!" I call out, "These are the people that killed Siren!"

I roll out of the way as I finish my sentence, just barely escaping the mad woman's katana. As I stand up out of my roll I see the elf innkeeper staring at me with wide eyes. She raises her left hand to her mouth and covers it as her eyes appear to tear up.

"Why are you talking to an NPC, dumbass!" I hear the woman shout behind me.

She gets a grip on my shoulders and pulls me, placing her foot behind me, making it easy for her to slam me against the ground. She stands over me and raises her weapon, ready to strike me down with a heavy blow. Her hands are about to swing down at me when I see a sharp piece of straight steel piercing her stomach. Her expression is priceless, the look of shock and surprise is unlike anything I've ever seen before. Then her body is brutally kicked away over me, standing where the woman was just a few seconds ago I can see Sylvianna, she holds a straight blade, it looks like just a simple, sharp, piece of steel, the grip being just a bunch of bandages wrapped around the bottom end of it.

Sylvianna offers me her hand and I don't waste a second in reaching out to her. She helps me on my feet and I turn around to face the woman with the katana. There is a big bright spot of damage over her stomach. Looking a bit past her I see Billfray unleashing a barrage of strikes at the axe wielder. He gets more than a few strikes in and even manages to cut one of his hands off.

"You are not lying to me," Sylvianna says, "Are you?"

I shake my head and see how her eyebrows dip, turning her expression into a raged frown. I can almost hear her grip tightening around her weapon.

"What the hell is wrong with this stupid NPC?" the woman asks.

"She is not just an NPC," I answer and jump towards the woman to attack.

Right behind me Sylvianna does the same and after the woman parries my attack Sylvianna has the opportunity to get three slashes at her. Sylvianna's sword flies smoothly through the air as she strike the woman, leaving shiny straight scars across her body. I regain my footing after my failed attack and stab the girl's side just as Sylvianna is done with her attacks. The katana wielder is not able to generate any other sound than pained grunts as we keep on a relentless attack.

"A little help here man!" Billfray yells.

I exchange a quick nod with Sylvianna and jump away to get myself closer to Billfray and the axe wielding man. I twirl my staff in my hands as I get closer and with both hands thrust the tip of my spear through his right leg. My attack distracts him enough for Billfray to be able to take a step closer and put the blade of his scythe behind the man's head. I see the blade of the scythe shine in an ominous red color and with a quick pull Billfray decapitates the man.

"That dude, was just too good," Billfray sighs, "Even after I cut his hand geez."

We hear a high pitched shriek which makes us both turn to where Sylvianna and the Katana wielder stand. We see the back of the woman with the katana for a few seconds before it bursts into tiny fragments of light. The one that remains standing is Sylvianna, but she drops to her knees, reveling her attackers katana embedded on her chest.

"Shit," Billfray mutters and makes a run towards the elf.

I follow him closely and manage to kneel myself next to her and hold her up straight as she is about to fall over. Billfray also gets on his knees and holds her from the other side.

"Pull that sword out," I order.

Billfray grabs the katana's grip and the moment he starts pulling Sylvianna screams in pain. This surprises Billfray and he stops pulling.

"Does it hurt?" he asks, sounding confused.

Sylvianna only nods, her eyes tearing up again as she rests her weight over me. Sylvianna is probably bound by other rules when it comes to pain or health points. She probably does feel pain, unlike us. The wound she currently sustains is probably going to kill her. I take out a small potion out of my inventory and uncap it. I rest the vial against her lips and tilt it a little to make her drink some of it. She quickly spits it out and lets out a really pained moan.

"Dammit," I huff, "What the hell do we do?"

Billfray shrugs and after messing with his menu he materializes a healing crystal over his hand.

"Come on, Sylvianna," he says, "Grab this, alright? Try to activate it."

The now weak elf wraps her hands around the crystal and squeezes it with all her might before letting it go, making it fall to the grass below her.

It's not going to work, she can't heal herself like we can. Dammit.

"It's…" she breathes, "It's quite alright."

After barely uttering those words she giggles a little before grunting again in pain.

"You two have been wonderful guests," she smiles, "I only wish I could've seen your friends as well."

"Sylvianna…" Billfray mumbles.

"I wish I could've seen that sweet girl Siren once more…" she cries softly.

She takes a hold of my hand and squeezes it tightly.

"Maybe, I'll go see her right now…right?" she asks.

There's something wrong with this picture. Someone who is not even real is telling me about how she wants to see a friend of hers in her deathbed. Yet it punches through me harder than any other death I've witnessed in this world. I feel a knot in my throat and I feel my lips tremble as I try to repress the tears trying to appear in my eyes.

"I'm sure, she is waiting for you," I answer.

The elf smiles, but again, the pain is too much for her to just try and hide.

"I'm scared," she cries as she squeezes my hand tighter.

"We are right here…" I say softly as I look away, no longer being able to stare down at the crying innkeeper, "We are right here."

I close my eyes and after a few seconds the weight that was leaning on me and the grip around my hand suddenly disappears. When I open my eyes I almost can't recognize where I am. The grass below me is now dry and scarce over the courtyard. The inside of the common area now looks as broken down and abandoned as the outside façade.

"It's like she was keeping this place alive…" Billfray comments.

I nod and slowly stand up, I take a quick look down and can only see a Katana on the ground, Sylvianna's body now long gone.

"We have to go elsewhere," I say, "This place apparently wasn't safe enough, it will probably be best to keep moving."

"Right," Billfray answers.

We go inside the now completely broken inn, each of our steps making a loud creaking noise across the floorboards. We walk down the small hallway that leads to the entrance. The lobby area was normally really clean and shiny, now the floor consists of broken boards and moldy spots. It's just such a terrible contrast.

I'm about to just step out of the inn when I notice Sylvianna's bottle of liquor still standing over the counter. It's open and next to it there's three glasses, all three of them filled hallway with what I can only assume is the liquor.

Feeling heavy I approach the counter and take two of the three glasses, I push one into Billfray's hands and keep the other for myself.

"What's this?" he asks

"Just drink it," I grunt.

I raise my glass just in front the last glass still standing over the counter.

"Cheers."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope this chapter serves as an apology for how crappy the last one was. Anyways not much to say right now, I'm really tired and hurting all over from yesterday. Concert was fun but now I'm paying the price.

**IC0: **I'm so sorry about the last chapter I truly mean it. Also yeah I had a little too much fun writing that little bit with Ruri. **Electronic Ink 0: **I did want for the guild to play some sort of role in the Gleam Eyes battle but due to my devotion to more or less keeping the canon intact I will have to refrain from doing so. **jtgamer-aza: **I'm glad to see my last chapter wasn't that much of a failure but I still do think I could've done better haha... **OneTiredSloth: **Haha I hope this covers your Aereth and Billfray questions, back to the usual length in chapters!

Well that's it for this weak, I'm tired as hell. As always if you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all next week!


	74. Chapter 74 - Holding On

**Chapter 74 – Holding On**

**October/25****th****/2024**

**First Floor of Aincrad – Black Iron Palace – Prison 2****nd**** Level**

**Alshep**

The wall behind me is very cold. It's almost as if this damn prison was designed to make everyone inside it uncomfortable. I wouldn't be surprised; everything in this world seems to be done with a particular purpose in mind. For starters every single thing from the very beginning has been made in such a way that it feels awkward. I don't think this is a design flaw, NerveGear limitation or something of the like. I actually think the bastard that trapped us here designed the very NerveGear and its capabilities in such a way as to make everything remind us that we are trapped. Kayaba Akihiko…damn you to hell. What kind of rotten mind would do this?

I push myself off the wall and walk a few steps forward. I grip the bars of my cell, after all in this small prison cell a few steps is all I can move about. A few steps to the right, a few steps to the left, a few steps back, a few steps forward. At the very least there is a very solid wall dividing me from the red players inside the prison. Come to think of it, wall aside the only thing dividing us right now is the fact that I have a different colored cursor. Whatever the reason may be, I have killed, the only difference here is that I have only killed people that have also done the same. I am player killer…killer.

I chuckle slightly and rest my head against the bars of my cell with a bit of a loud thud.

Is there a line when it comes to killing? What makes me so different from these red cursor players? Am I a good guy for killing people that are evil? Am I just like them?

"Ah," a voice exclaims, "You finally up?"

This particular voice I have grown to expect. It's a bit high pitched for a man, but his tone is still low enough to make him sound a bit old and manly. I didn't get to take a look at him as I was brought in here with a bag over my head, but the owner of said voice is a man called Haizobu. He is one of the other prisoners, his cell just happens to be next to mine. He has a cellmate, unlike me. I have been conversing with him in the past few days. I'm not sure about the color of his cursor, but the way he talks and the way in which our conversations go, I just can't bring myself to think that he is a bad guy. Even if he is, at the very least he sounds sane.

"I've been up for a while…" I admit.

"I see, heh, after all we are way past through the afternoon," he says, "Keeping silent today?"

"I guess," I sigh, "I'm not really in the mood…sorry."

I hear him chuckle, his small laugh starts to draw out and suddenly he finds himself without air. As he breathes in to recover I reply.

"Why is that funny?"

"You are apologizing," he says, "It's really none of my business how you spend your day. However you do reply whenever I talk, so I guess you could say I've grown a bit fond of our conversations."

"I guess I have also enjoyed our talks..." I answer.

I wrap my fingers against the bars of my cell, getting a better grip on the bars themselves. I sigh and pull on them a little. There's something about these bars. I know there is no way I will ever be able to pry them apart or make my way through them, but every now and then I will try to pull on them or something of the sorts. I guess in a way I still have some sort of hope.

"How long have I been in here?" I ask.

"Well considering I've been here for one hundred and thirty eight days…" Haizobu ponders, "You arrived on day one hundred and twenty one…you've been here seventeen days friend."

Haizobu likes to tell people how long he's been a prisoner. I've heard him say several iterations of that number; however I do not possess his memory. If I did, I think I would go insane. I've been here less than three weeks and I can feel as I'm starting to lose my composure.

The poor man has been here for at least a third of a year and he sounds fine. Then again, I believe my description of "fine" has been modified ever since I found myself trapped in a video game.

"It feels like it's been ages…" I huff.

"Give it a hundred and thirty so more days, you'll get used to it," he laughs.

I chuckle as well.

I release the bars from my grasp and take a few steps back, knowing exactly where the pathetic excuse of a bed is I sit down. Once again I rest my back against the cold wall. I drag my menu down and quickly move the interface over to the tab that displays my messages. I've sent a total of forty eight messages since I got thrown into this cell. I'm yet to get a single reply. The only reasoning I have behind this is the possibility that the prison itself does not allow me to get any messages. The system shows me they my own messages have been delivered, but I don't have any answers to any of them.

The better portion of my messages is addressed to Elina. I write about how much I miss her, I tell her that I love her; I apologize to her for everything I've done, I complain about not being able to know if she is actually seeing my messages. I've also sent messages to everyone in the guild, except for Billfray and Aereth, who I have avoided in order to keep any links to what happened with Miku in the boss room severed. I ask Esra how she is doing, what has she been doing, if she feels any better about what happened to her. I send messages to Aeri also asking about her wellbeing, wondering if she has gone out of her way to track LC members again. I beg Kayla to keep an eye on everyone and send Ruri the one or two dirty jokes that pop into my mind when I have nothing else to do.

I frown at my menu, knowing well enough that throwing any kind of tantrum will no fix anything, but I do so anyways as I swipe my menu away with a grunt.

"I need to get out of here…" I say to myself.

"Well," Haizobu mumbles, "As I have said before, unless you have the keys to these cells you are not going anywhere."

"I'm speaking out loud again, huh?"

"You do so often," he laughs, "Did it start here or did you also do it before you were imprisoned?"

"Geez," I sigh, "Don't you speak to yourself from time to time?"

"Can't say that I do," he says, "I like to keep that kind of chatter inside my head."

"For some reason that manages to sound even weirder than just speaking out loud to yourself," I laugh.

Who doesn't enjoy their inner monologue from time to time anyway? It's better than staying all quiet without saying a thing. Then again, speaking only to yourself doesn't sound like the sanest thing.

I perk my head at the sound of whistling and screams coming from down the cells. You can hear something of the sorts when the guards are making their rounds. Every single player in here has a nice thing or two to say to the guards. These nice things usually involve a lot of the word "fuck" in its many conjugations, sometimes with colorful combinations of other nouns and adjectives. My vocabulary has increased quite a lot in the past seventeen days. Although it's no vocabulary Elina would approve of.

"Oh boy," Haizobu says, "Sounds like someone is going to pay us a visit."

Our particular cell block grows quiet with expectation and I make my way to the front of my cell in order to take a peek at whatever poor soul decided to his rounds today. I leisurely lean against the bars of my cell and straining my eyes a little to take a look at the stairs that connect this block to the one above. I make out a graceful figure in the distance, one in red and white clothes, an unmistakable shade of brown-ish, chestnut hair. Close behind this figure walks a man in typical ALF attire, probably a guard assigned to escort her down here.

It's Asuna, no doubt about it.

Whistling and people calling Asuna unspeakable things all of the sudden becomes deafening. I can now sadly add to my list of life experiences to have witnessed more than a dozen people cat call and insult a girl that is roughly my age. However Asuna is the kind of person that knows how to deal with shitty situations like this. Keeping her head up with a cold stare she makes her way through the cell block.

"She is coming this way, huh?" Haizobu says, "Didn't she pay you a visit not too long ago? She came by with your other lady friends."

"Your point?"

"I'm just curious friend," he replies, "No need to get angry."

"It's this cell," Asuna states firmly to the guard accompanying her as she points in my direction.

"Are you sure?" the guard questions, "I can't just allow you to boost anyone out of here, you have to make sure this is the man you are looking for."

"It's him," Asuna says, "Now open his cell, or do you want me to get Thinker down here?"

Despite half of the man's face being hiding by his helmet it's too easy to see that he is scared by Asuna's tone. He swallows his own spit and slowly walks closer to me, approaching my cell as he nervously fumbles around with some keys. Taking my eyes back to Asuna I can see her wear a smile as she looks at me. Still feeling rather betrayed I give her the stink-eye and step back from the bars in order to sit back down on my small bed. Her smile disappears as the guard opens my cell.

"Alright then," the guard says, "Try to make it quick, I don't want it to get too rowdy in here."

"I will take as long as I need to," Asuna scoffs.

"Fine, geez," the guard says and turns around to leave, "You KoB types…christ."

I lean forward and rest my elbows over my own legs. I'm trying real hard to look cool and more importantly to make it clear that I'm not exactly pleased with the sight of Asuna at the moment.

"Alshep, I'm here to apologize," she says softly.

"What? Here to doubt me some mo-" I stop and process her sentence with utmost care, "…wait what?"

"I said I'm here to apologize," she says and raises her right hand to twirl her index finger around her hair, "You were right, I'm sorry for not trusting you. I'm real sorry."

The all too familiar feeling of having said something that has made me look like an asshole settles in nicely. I find myself all sorts of confused. In what particular topic am I right? And what exactly is she apologizing for? It suddenly clicks, the claims I made once I got thrown into this cell, my conjectures and assumptions, could've they been right?

"I know it must have been hard to believe," I say, "We thought that we erased Laughing Coffin out of existence, but we didn't…the girl I killed, the one from the ALF, she was LC, I swear."

"I believe you now…" Asuna says, "We found another member trying to pose as a green player inside an important guild."

I really wanted that assumption of mine not to be true, because it means there must be more than a handful of LC members that remain alive and are free to roam about Aincrad, worst of all…that more than a few of them have a green cursor over their heads.

"The ALF must be riddled with even more members then," I huff, "Asuna, this is freaking dangerous, we have to conduct background checks or something. I know it sounds dumb, but how can we be so sure the ALF is even on the clearers side?"

"This other member was among the KoB…" she admits.

Asuna's sight points itself to the floor and letting out a tired sigh she grabs her left arm with her right hand. The way Asuna is presenting herself right makes it painfully clear that she isn't happy or proud about her past actions.

"However, I believe you are right in the fact that we can no longer even trust our own," she says firmly, "We'll have to find a way to make sure we don't encounter any more of these…sleeper agents."

I nod and watch her drop to her knees, after which she lowers her entire body in deep bow. Taken by her action I reach down for her and try to get her on her feet. I pull on her arm but she refuses to stand up.

"I'm so sorry, Al," she says, "My poor decision making caused all of this, I could've done something to avoid it all, but it felt as if I was frozen. Please forgive me!"

"Come on," I say, "We all make mistakes."

"Just please say you forgive," she begs, "I just need to hear it…"

A half smile forms with my lips and as I close my eyes I push air out through my nose.

"I forgive you, Asuna."

She rises from the floor and smiles at me.

"I guess it is quite obvious now, but I'm here to set you free, I'm also freeing myself in way…" she says.

"What do you mean?" I ask

"I'm quitting the KoB for a while, these clothes are merely formality right now," she comments as she tugs at the end of her red mini skirt.

Again I take more than a solid two seconds to process what the poster girl of the KoB just said. I tilt my head in confusion. She must be kidding or something. She is practically more important to the KoB than their damn leader Heathcliff, she is the face of the KoB, and she's been at every damn clearing fight.

"You must be joking…" I mutter.

She smiles and brings down her menu, with a few swipes and selections her figure starts shining with a bright light. Her red and white attire along with her rapier disappear. Funny enough her clothes change to a denim mini skirt and a white top with red laces and buttons, I guess some habits are tough to beat.

"I'm not," she says, "I'll be taking some time off."

She raises her left hand and then holds it clothes to her person with her right hand.

"I now have someone really special I wish to go back to," she says with a slight blush and a sincere smile.

I notice her right index finger and thumb gently rubbing a shiny silver ring on her left hand. I chuckle to myself and then grin at Asuna who quickly notices her actions, turning her slightly rosy cheeks into a full blown blush as she tries to hide her ring with by covering it with her free hand.

Someone really special to go back to and a ring around her pretty ring finger on her left hand, as I analyze the small situation I grin. Did the lady knight of the blood went and got married without inviting me?

"So tell me," I say, still grinning, "Who did the best player of the KoB deemed worthy to marry?"

"I…uh, well, you know him, but…" she stammers, "Let's not go into detail with that."

She starts laughing awkwardly and with her inhuman like speed places herself behind me. Still maintaining her nervous laughter she starts pushing me out of the cell. I try to refuse at first, but Asuna is too strong for me to try and push with my back.

"Hey, come on, at the very least tell me who he is!" I whine, "That way I can pay him a visit if he mistreats you or something."

"Hush now," she says as she successfully pushes me out of the cell.

"Alright, I'll have to bother you some other day," I tease, "As for right now, I might not have a ring, but I also have someone pretty special to go back to."

"Aww, that's such a sweet, romantic thing to say," Asuna comments, "Totally unlike anything else that comes out of your mouth."

I raise an eyebrow feeling just a tad bit injured by Asuna's low blow.

"Hey, hey," I blurt out, "You have to calm down with that kind of comments, look, you can start with that sharp tongue of yours again when I free you of a prison in which you spent seventeen days wrongfully imprisoned."

"Don't rub it in…geez," she says.

Asuna's eyes suddenly widen and she pulls down her menu, after a quick second of looking at it I see her eyes are dead centered on the part of the menu that shows the current time. She then dismisses the menu.

"I'm kind of late for something," she says, "I'll see you later."

With that she runs to the flight of stairs that lead further up the prison. Despite her speed she comes to a sudden and complete stop right the bottom of the stairs. She slowly turns around with a serious look.

"Hey Al…"

"Yeah?"

"You keep an eye out," she says, "Take care of your guild, you guys deserve a break."

She laughs softly and then smiles widely one last time.

"You guys are good guys, hehe," she says, "I hope this world can be nicer to all of you, you guys truly deserve it."

I'm hit with an uncomfortable feeling of déjà vu, but for some reason it makes me smile.

"I'll try my best," I say confidently, "You enjoy your break, and also…be careful."

She nods and hurries up the stairs after giving me a quick wave goodbye.

"Well aren't you the lucky guy," Haizobu speaks.

I immediately turn around to finally see the face of the man I have been talking to for the better part of almost three weeks. He has an orange colored cursor of his head; he covers the lower part of his face with a gray scarf. His eyes look tired and bloodshot, slightly long black unkempt hair falls down the sides of his head. I could find a dozen of words to describe his overall look, but all of them might be a little too offensive. Still when I look at this tired man I see a friend, I see the man that basically kept me company while I was trapped here with his stories and anecdotes.

"I should've told her to spring you as well," I say quietly.

"It's quite alright," he says with a laugh, "Someone like me shouldn't be allowed out of here for a while longer."

"Haizobu…" I mutter, "You are not a bad guy."

"I am not, not right now at least," he chuckles, "Ah…that sounds a little too edgy, but the reason as to why I'm here is not a pleasant one, and despite the long time I have been down here I'm still sane enough to realize that I need to repent for what I did. I still haven't, so it will be a while before I get another shot at redemption, friend."

I nod at him and watch him as he reaches for his scarf with his right hand. He pulls on the thing, revealing a smirk under it.

"Now go!" he says, "Before I get mad for not being set free as well!"

I return the smirk and without missing a heartbeat start running to the stairs. Once at the bottom of the flight of stairs I start jumping my way up, completely ignoring pairs of steps at a time. It doesn't take long to reach the first level of the prison; I eagerly dash through it as well and reach the final flight of stairs. At the very top of it I can see the orange light of the sun painting the sky above Starting City. I feel wide grin over my face, it almost hurts, it's been almost a month since I last smiled like this. I raise my leg and slam my foot against the penultimate step in the set of stairs. With all my strength I jump out, clearing the last step and quite a few meters out of the door. I land on my feet and quickly position my feet to slide my way out into the streets next to the Black Iron Palace.

Without any command at all my sword appears on its sheathe right at my hip and almost on instinct I unsheathe my weapon, relishing in the sweet noise of steel coming out of its sheathe. The prison didn't allow for me to access any of my items, so I had been a bit worried about whether or not they had taken my sword away. I swing it around in front of me a couple of times and advance appropriately with my feet as I swing at the air. It almost feels like I muscle I haven't used in a while, but I still have the hang of it, it's second nature, just like it was before. I feel my sword vibrate in my hand and finishing my swings with a quick straight thrust as my blade shines a bright red color. I stand up straight and then put my sword back inside its sheathe. All of that just felt extremely satisfying for some reason.

I turn around to the door I jumped out of just a few seconds ago and see two guards staring at me with completely and utterly perplexed expressions. One starts laughing and looks away.

"Dumbass…" says the other.

Normally I would answer back, but I have to get back to everyone right now. I'm about to start sprinting to the main plaza of Starting City when I get bombarded with a barrage of notification sounds. I pull down my menu to reveal a total of eighty seven new messages. As I walk I start opening every single one of them. I start from the oldest I received, practically ignoring the new ones.

-From: Elina  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: Miss you  
-Message: I'm just wondering if sending these messages to you works. I had my worries about not being able to message you, but I forgot to ask Asuna about it. Let's just say I'm not in the mood for talking to her after today. I hope you get out of there soon, I know I just saw you a few hours ago but…I miss you…I love you.

Most of her early messages are all like that, she wonder if I'm getting her messages at all, she explains she has been receiving messages from me, but that she believes I'm not getting hers. On a later message she confirms this by saying she never checked if the messages were delivered to begin with.

-From: Elina  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: I'm dumb  
-Message: So Kayla just told me there is a way to see if the message was delivered to the person you sent it to. I never realized you could check if they had been delivered. I guess I will need to thank her later. I will keep writing though…maybe that way you can get a million messages from yours truly when you finally get out of there. I hope you are doing well, love you.

Without even realizing I have kept walking all the way to the teleport plaza. However, I'm not even halfway through all the replies I've got from everyone. I sit down on one of the benches around the area and keep going through the messages. I got time to kill, and if I finish going through these I might catch up on what's been happening since my imprisonment.

-From: Esra  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: Re: How's everything?  
-Message: It's great to see you are able to send messages from prison, Master. Thank you for worrying, I have been doing well for the most part, I have a few sleepless nights here and there, but nothing that interferes with my chores. I'm yet to hear from Billfray or Aereth, but I believe they are doing fine, after all, the guild tracker seems to place them in Sylvianna's Inn.

Esra goes on to say how she wants to pay them a visit and cook them some real food. I laugh a little as I see how she still boasts about beating that silly elf on her cooking contest. Same as Elina her other messages go on to say how she didn't realize her messages weren't being delivered.

-From: Ruri  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: Re: jokes  
-Message: Aw man, that's weak as hell. If we are going to be sending us dumb jokes at least make them as filthy as possible my dear good friend. I shall demonstrate. Say, say, what did the lesbian vampire say to the other lesbian vampire?  
I'll give you a few seconds to think.  
Nothing?  
Ok here it goes…SEE YOU NEXT MONTH!

I weird mixture of both disgust and laughter brews inside me but I'm unsure as to which one to actually let out of my being. I laugh a little, but at the same time feel the strong need to drink a bottle of mouthwash. Unlike Esra and Elina, Ruri just ignores the fact that I'm not receiving her messages; our exchange of jokes didn't really require a conversation so it seems that she never noticed I wasn't actually replying to anything she said.

I start reading Kayla's messages, on her first messages she says to be testing whether or not I'm receiving her messages. On the second one she realizes the futility of it all and says how she will keep an eye on everyone, just like I asked her, but that she doesn't see the point in replying any further since I will not be receiving the messages until I get out. After those messages I see I have received several from Aeri, in-between Aeri's messages there are a few from Elina and some more jokes from Ruri, but the ones from Aeri trouble me.

-From: Aeri  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: When are they releasing you?  
-Message: I'm just wondering…there's been some stuff happening…I should've told you sooner. Just…get out of there as soon as you can alright?

About four messages in a row from her keep asking when I'm going to be let out and that she needs to talk to me with urgency. She also explains how she is getting messages from me, but that none of them seem to be making sense. Understandable, given how I just kept asking how everyone was doing and if something new had developed. I can feel the urgency in her messages, but instead of getting off my ass and hurrying home I keep reading.

-From: Aeri  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: hurry please  
-Message: i wanted to tell in person but…I cant wait anymore I know I should have told you sooner but im seeing her again she is back please please hurry home I need help

Message after message her own typing starts dropping in quality, she forgets about simple stuff like stops and commas. Towards the end I can barely understand or see any coherence in her messages.

-From: Aeri  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: how ar eyou  
-Message: i went out at night y esterday againn I found some members from the giggling caskets Al~ i found them and i killed themmm they wont tell me where klaus is they say even less about pohhh but i know they are aroun dthey are watching ussss i know so

-From: Kayla  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: Aeri is acting up  
-Message: I should've sent this message sooner, but there was no point in doing so, after all you probably can't read it yet. I've caught Aeri sneaking out at night, I followed her once and tried to confront it about it, but she get kind of aggressive with me. She locks herself in her room the moment she gets back to the house, and I hear her talking inside, but no one is in there with her. Fuck, I don't know what to do anymore, me and the girls will try to calm her down or something, but I fear this might get out of hand.

I swallow my own spit, for some reason I feel having a hard time even doing so. I keep reading, disregarding any more jokes from Ruri and lovey dovey messages from Elina. After Kayla's message explaining her concern for Aeri I no longer seem to have received more messages from Aeri, however there's more than a few from Kayla, Elina, Esra, Ruri and even Sinna telling me about Aeri. I keep skimming through the messages until I start getting to the most recent ones, one from Aereth.

-From: Aereth  
-To: Alshep  
-Subject: LC is on the move  
-Message: Yesterday we had an encounter with some members of LC inside Sylvianna's Inn. We took them down, sadly we couldn't ask question but they are going out of their way to track us down. I already warned the girls, so I feel the need to warn you despite our...radio silence if you want to call it that. They killed Sylvianna man…she didn't even have anything to do with this, she was just trying to help us. Keep a god dammed eye out the second you get out of prison.  
I will keep moving around with Billfray, I don't want to risk going back to the house just yet. Good luck to you, I know we need some.

I dismiss my menu and get up from my seat. I look around the plaza trying to spot any suspicious individuals. I come up with nothing, there is not a single person in the plaza besides me. I make a run for the teleport gate and send myself to Barrowdell, the second I feel the floor under my feet I start running through the crowd of people. Pushing some to the side and trying to go around the ones I have enough time to dodge. I make my way to the guild house in record time and slam the door open.

"You have to calm down Aeri!" Kayla yells.

I walk into a very tense scene where Kayla is trying to restrain Aeri on the floor. Aeri is practically snarling like some kind of crazed animal. Elina jumps into the picture and helps Kayla on trying to hold Aeri down.

"Master!" I hear from the side, "You are out?!"

I nod in Esra direction, her faces changes from worry to a calmer expression as she approaches me. She closes the door behind me and stands right at my side seconds after.

"We didn't know what to do anymore," Esra says with worry, "W-we had Ruri pick the lock to Aeri's room so we could get her out of there."

"Yoh!" I hear Ruri exclaim from behind Kayla.

The ashen haired girl is just standing over there, she seems unsure about what she should do.

"Get off of me!" Aeri yells.

Elina's gaze finds me and she suddenly freezes, she smiles, but sadly she gets distracted allowing Aeri to push her away, after which she pushes Kayla as well. Aeri stands up and I notice that she has her red gauntlets equipped. Her face and body is shining with bright scars thanks to them.

"Look Aeri!" Kayla huffs as she stands up from the floor, "Al is here! Look!"

"Al…Al!" Aeri yelps as her eyes struggle to focus on me, "Help me…help me…tell her to shut up…please!"

"What is she talking about?" Kayla asks, looking beyond distressed.

I take a look at Elina who awkwardly looks away from both Kayla and Aeri. She is the only one besides me that has some of idea of what is happening to Aeri.

Aeri stumbles in my direction and I walk towards her, once I'm close enough she throws herself at me wraps her arms around me. Despite this being a safe area I feel her fingers digging into my skin thanks to her gauntlets.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" she bawls, "Please help me, I'm sorry!"

She keeps clawing at my back, but ultimately she seems to be calming down. I hold her head and pat her back as I find myself with nothing else to do in the situation.

"Why did they let you out?" Elina asks as she gets closer.

"Asuna found more LC members hiding amongst the clearing guilds," I say.

"Aw crap," Ruri comments, "Those dudes are everywhere, huh?"

"Mr. Guild Leader!" Sinna screams, "They let you out of prison!"

I see her run to the stairs on the second floor and she rushes down the spiral stairs.

"Are you guys going to ignore me?!" Kayla says a bit desperately, "What the hell is up with Aeri?"

Aeri stops clawing at me and separates herself from me a bit. She looks at me with teary eyes and looks away as she purses her lips.

"I…" she says, "I…"

She looks at me again and nods slowly. She is unable to say it on her own I believe, but now is not the time to keep hiding things from people.

"I've got a few things to explain," I state.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

This update is coming on a little late, I apologize for that, but we are here! WOOO! *confetti* I got nothing to complain about this week, so let's go on to the reviews! (Let me say it's super cool to have more than two people that leave reviews every chapter now, I like it!)

**Electronic Ink 0: **Yeah haha I totally made a thing inside a thing inside a thing inside another thing! To be honest I didn't have fun writing Sylvie's death. I mean she was a minor as minor characters get in my story, but geez I got sad writing that. **OneTiredSloth: **LET THE FEELS TRAIN CONSUME YOU MY SLOTH FRIEND. **jtgamer-aza: **Glad to see more than a few people actually liked Sylvianna a lot, I mean I'm sorry I killed, but I'm glad you guys liked her...does that make sense? **IC0: **Haha thanks for the nice comments about the crappy chapter being ok within the bigger story, but I just disappointed myself with that chapter to be honest. Then again I believe I must look at it like you do. It can't all be 10/10 I mean I try, but of course not every chapter will meet my expectations as a writer! Thank you so much for your words!

That is all for this week, as always if you like what you read, please leave a review! I will see you all next week!


	75. Chapter 75 - Reaper, Reaper

**Chapter 75 – Reaper, Reaper**

**October/30****th****/2024**

**Fifty Eight Floor of Aincrad – Danac Outskirts**

**Aeri**

Deep breaths…it's all about deep breaths.

I close my eyes and drop my right hand to touch the white picket fence just on my side. As I walk I drag my fingers over the pickets, getting a good feel of the wood every time my fingers happen to stumble upon one. Once I make contact I make sure to press my finger against the top of it and then drag it a long as I keep walking.

"We have been walking for a long while now…" Sinna whines.

As I finish dragging my finger one more time I pull it back quickly, because of the sudden sensation of something forcefully digging into it. I raise my finger up to my face and see a single white splinter burrowed into my finger. This stupid game is too detailed when it comes to annoying crap. I pull it out and notice the tiny red glow appear where the splinter was. I sigh and turn to Sinna, who is walking on my left.

"I know sweetie, we'll be going back home in a bit," I say, "So just try to endure it a bit longer, alright?"

I hear Mirai groan, apparently in disgust, her figure appears before my eyes just behind Sinna and I can easily make out her disgusted face.

"Sweetie! Honey!" she teases, "I seriously cannot understand the pet names, you treat her like your little sister…worse…you treat her like your child."

She starts laughing and as I keep walking I can see her lowering her stance and placing her face uncomfortably close to Sinna's.

"We both know you are irreparably fucked in the head, but why do you have to add this kind of creepy relationship into the mix?" she says.

I try my best to ignore her but the fact that she is teasing me while appearing too close to Sinna is bothering me way more than it should. I bite my lip and keep my feet on the move. However Sinna has noticed how my sight seems to be fixed on her.

"Something wrong?" she asks, and all of the sudden looks around frantically, "Is she here?"

"I am! I am!" Mirai says with joy in her tone, "Let's play a game of guessing little girl! I'm guessing she is going to tell you I'm not and that everything is ok!"

"I…uhm," I mumble, "It's ok…she…she isn't here right now."

"See! I told you!" Mirai laughs.

"Ok…ok," Sinna replies, "Be sure to tell me if you see her, you promised to tell me if you saw her."

"Too bad she isn't very good with promises little girl," Mirai huffs and slowly vanishes out of sight.

I nod and place my hand on top of Sinna's head, I ruffle her hair a little bit and drag down my menu to take a look at the quest tracker. We still have to take down ten more Berserk Imps for this quest.

Before Al got thrown into the jail going out has consisted of two things. Going out questing and doing so in order to try and draw someone from Laughing Coffin out. It's dangerous, we all know so, but it's better than staying at home, scared or with our damn arms crossed.

The path we are walking on starts leading us inside a small patch of trees and the sudden coolness of the shadows the trees cast robs me of the warmth of the sun. Also, I can't help to notice the indistinct chatter of a group of players the left the town shortly after us. They are more than several feet away from us, but I can still make out bits and pieces of their conversations. Most of it sounds like nonsense; however I'm annoyed that they opted to take the same path as us.

"Speaking of seeing things…" Ruri says softly as she catches up to me.

"Already told you I would rather not talk about it," I sigh.

"Aw, come on," she whines, "How can you expect me not to be curious about it?"

I turn my body away from Sinna in order to face the pervert and reach out to her to pinch her cheek. I manage to get a hold of it and pull on her a little until I see her face tell me to let go. However, I do not let go.

"I don't expect you not to be curious," I say, "I just expect you not to bring it up, just like I asked you."

"But where ish the fun in that?" she says through my pinching.

"Back off Ruri," Kayla says.

"Thanks, Kayla," I say as I turn to her.

She stares back with a rather analytical look in her face and quickly looks in another direction.

"I bet it must be hard not to stare at things you find weird, huh?" I hear Mirai muttering.

"Yeah, don't mention it…" Kayla mumbles.

I shouldn't be surprised, but at the same time that stupid part of me expected everyone to handle the situation like Elina and Sinna have. They show me a lot of pity, which I don't really need, but at the very least they aren't treating me like some sort of interesting animal or something of the sort. They are worried and would like to help me out, unlike Kayla and Ruri. Kayla keeps most of it to herself, but I have caught her staring at me more times than I'm comfortable admitting. However, Ruri as expected is miles away from being subtle.

"But what if…" Ruri says.

"Ruri!" Kayla yells.

"Hey! Hey!" Ruri exclaims, "Listen to what I have to say! What if? I told you something about myself that more or less rivaled this secret of yours! Then would you let me ask a few questions?"

"The pervert just can't help herself, huh?" Mirai mumbles, "At least she isn't as annoying as the maid."

I chuckle a bit and rotate my wrist around a bit until I hear it crack.

"That's going to be a little hard, but I guess it sounds fair," I say without thinking.

I hear Kayla sigh behind me and I feel my screen crawl as Ruri links her left arm to my right one. She is giggling as she tugs me a bit ahead of everyone. I think I can count with one hand the number of times I've made a mistake like this with Ruri. This would make it the fourth time. In the back of my head I can make out a faint laugh, belonging to Mirai.

"How about my real name?" Ruri says, "How about I tell you that?"

While it isn't exactly a bad deal, I can't really understand why she would think it is acceptable as trade of sorts. I've always been curious about everyone's real name though, it's the one thing that has been forbidden ever since I met Elina, Al and Daath. It interests me, but I'm not sure if I would be able to budge so easily.

"Just stop pestering her, alright?" Kayla insists, "We still have to kill more Imps so we can head home, so stop bothering her and start looking for Imps!"

With my arm still linked to Ruri's she pulls me around with her and she extends her free arm to point at her girlfriend.

"Booooo, you are no fun," Ruri complains, "You are as curious as I am, but you would rather just stare and judge than actually ask her!"

"I'm….I….I am not!" Kayla answers, her face being more honest than her words.

"What if?! Kayla also tells you her real name?" Ruri keeps pushing.

"I'll tell you this, while this whole day has been boring and uneventful it beats spending another day with the maid, Al's girlfriend and…him for that matter," Mirai spits.

Ruri pulls us back around, but not before I notice the group of players who was behind us not long ago is now no longer in sight.

"Sharp eye," Mirai laughs, "Do you think our friends will pay us a visit today? After all you did kill about three of them that other night."

I hardly doubt that the players that were behind us moments ago have anything to do with Laughing Coffin, then again it doesn't hurt to be playing a defensive card at this point.

"I don't know Ruri…" I mutter, "This is more about me not being comfortable with discussing the topic, not whether or not I consider what you offer fair."

"What if…" Sinna starts.

Mirai bursts into laughter and she slowly materializes right in front of me once more. She is bending over in laughter, eerily staying in front of me despite me walking towards her.

"What if I also tell you my real name!?" she proposes.

I'm a bit hurt by Sinna's curiosity, so far she appeared to be more supportive than curious, and that in a way gave me comfort. I thought that at least she wouldn't be asking questions and that when I needed her she would be there for me, but I guess my confession left more questions than answers.

I look around once more, trying to spot the group of players that suddenly disappeared, but all I see is Mirai standing wherever I look with a big wide grin over her face. I wonder if I should tell them about that group of players. Finally refocusing back on topic I realize I haven't provided an answer to Sinna's recent proposal.

I sigh, hanging my head to side in the process.

"Alright, but you guys say your names first," I say.

I would be lying if I said I wasn't excited. There's something behind this name thing that really makes me giddy, as if knowing their real names would open a new window to who they are. It was kind of similar with Al…or rather, Yuuji. Knowing his real name made me feel closer to him, after all it was the one thing he kept from me ever since first met. To say the least, it was refreshing.

"Alright then!" Ruri exclaims, and finally let's go of my arm, "I'll go first then!"

"I haven't even agreed to this!" Kayla huffs.

"Come on, stop pretending," Ruri says as she points at her girlfriend for a second time, "You want to know more too!"

Kayla looks away quickly with a pout and then her gaze slowly returns to us. She goes through a series of conflicted expressions and then sighs out loudly.

"Fine…ok…" she gives in.

"Alrighty!" Ruri yells in excitement, "The name of yours truly is….drum roll please!"

The only sound after Ruri's attempted dramatic pause is not a drum roll, but the faint sound of our footsteps as we finally make it out of the patch of trees and back into the dirt road surrounded by picket fences.

"Ahem!" Ruri clears her throat dramatically.

"Oh!" Sinna exclaims and seconds after starts hitting her legs with her palms to imitate a drum roll.

"Thanks, darling," Ruri says, she then clears her throat again; "My name is Matsuda Ran!"

I can't help, but to chuckle briefly along with Kayla. Sinna doesn't laugh, very differently from Kayla and me she instead walks with a face in awe after hearing Ruri's real name. Ruri turns to Kayla with an upset expression.

"You laughed again?!" she retorts, "Be like Sinna, she appreciates it, even if it doesn't sound girly!"

"What do you mean?!" Sinna replies, "It's the prettiest name I have ever heard!"

"Huh?" Ruri blurts out in surprise.

"Ran! It's written with the same kanji that means orchid, right?!" Sinna explains.

"It is?" Ruri asks confused and then turns to Kayla, "It is!"

"It's kind of sad that a girl that is years younger than us has a better hang of kanji than ourselves…" Kayla admits.

"I didn't think of kanji either…" I admit, "Though, I guess seeing it in this new light, it does fit you."

I finish my sentence with a grin, and as I was half expecting Ruri approaches me with a smile and practically glittering eyes.

"You mean it?" she asks.

"Yeah," I say, "In a way I guess you are in fact the very embodiment of something…exotic."

She pouts at me at me and throws a punch, aiming at my arm. Without noticing I raise my hand and hold her punch as she is about to hit me. It's when I notice that I'm squeezing her fist rather forcefully that I let go of her hand.

"I…uh… sorry about that…" I apologize.

"Geeeeez, it was going to be a playful punch," she says.

I laugh awkwardly and scratch the back of my head.

"Now you go Kayla!" Ruri says and hangs back to walk next to her lover.

"Alright, alright," Kayla says, "My name is…"

Instantly Sinna starts her drum roll once again.

"I don't need that," Kayla shuts her down.

"Aw…" Sinna says softly.

"My name is Nagata Sumiko," Kayla says proudly as she presses her left hand over her chest.

"That's….uh….uhm," Sinna says as she presses both of her hands to her head, "ko… the kanji for ko means child…I don't remember what the one for sumi meant…"

Kayla grabs Ruri's arm and pulls her close.

"It's ok, you don't have to tell me what it means," Kayla laughs and harshly grinds her knuckles on top of Ruri's head, "It's your turn though."

I see weird figures in the distance behind us as I turn just slightly from hearing Kayla's real name. I discard the image to keep walking but it's just too odd to ignore.

"Hey, our friends are back," Mirai mutters.

I turn my head to the back of the road and see a group of players emerge out of the patch of trees in the distance. I could be mistaken, but they appear to be the same group of people that where following us from the starts. It still feels kind of fishy, but I'm leaning on the idea that maybe they aren't following us with ill intent. There are four of them and they all seem to be walking close together to each other. I'm still focusing too hard on them when I hear Sinna's voice.

"My name is Morita Nao!" she says with a giddy tone, "My name is weird and there really isn't a single kanji for it, so it means tons of stuff!"

"That's lame," Ruri huffs.

"Ruri!" Kayla snaps as she hits her girlfriend over the head.

"Yeah, that was rude…" I mutter.

"I didn't mean it like that!" Ruri whines as she rubs her head, "I meant that she didn't exactly know the kanji for her name when she did for everyone else, that's what's lame."

I put my hand over Sinna's shoulder and give her a light pat.

"I think it's really cute," I say with a smile, "Mine is Kanada Mirai."

Immediately I cover my mouth and curse myself. I let myself go by the feeling of trust among us in that brief moment. I let my hands drop from my mouth and shrug. I guess it isn't that bad, but then again I could've kept it to myself.

"Score!" Ruri says and she makes a little jump, "Can I still ask you a few things?"

"That hardly seems fair now," Mirai says softly, "You did fuck up on your own though, so I guess you have to honor the deal. Then again, you aren't one to keep your word often."

I don't like the times when I find myself agreeing with Mirai but this is one of those times. I stop and breathe in deeply; this has to be the first time we've stopped since we started walking. Oddly enough my eye catches the group behind us also stopping. I raise an eyebrow and stare for a few seconds.

"It can't be a coincidence can it?" Mirai asks, "Maybe you should tell your friends."

"Yeah sure…" I answer, a bit absentmindedly, "Ask your questions."

Ruri, Kayla and Sinna gather up and get in front of me. All three of them seem to have questions to ask, Ruri and Kayla I can understand, but I still feel somewhat betrayed at seeing Sinna so eager to discuss the topic.

"Alright, alright…" Ruri says, "What is she like? You know, the girl you see?"

"Are you going to be honest about this?" Mirai teases, "Or are we going to keep adding points to your amazing track record of lies?"

"She is just like a blur…" I answer.

"Well that is not exactly a lie," Mirai scoffs.

"Does she look like anyone you know?" Ruri follows up.

I swallow my own spit and laugh awkwardly. I turn around and keep walking on the road, expecting them to follow me. I have to see if the group of players behind us is up to something.

"Not at all…she is just like this dark…blurry silhouette…" I lie.

"Adding points I guess," Mirai laughs.

I look over my shoulder and see the players are on the move once more. There's definitely something up with them. I return my eyes to the dirt road ahead of and start to worry. There's four of them and four of us. I would like to count Sinna as someone who is battle ready, but I very much doubt that is the case. I raise my right hand and bite on my thumb.

That makes three of us who would actually be able to fight back. Depending on what weapons these guys are carrying, we could be at a disadvantage. I have some potions, but I didn't bring any healing crystals, so overusing Bloodlust isn't really a plan in right now.

"You really should tell your friends…" Mirai suggests.

"How often do you hear her?" Sinna asks.

"Not too often," I chuckle, "She is just a random annoyance…."

"Another lie," the blur speaks back, "I'm here all the time…sweetie."

There's another patch of forest right ahead of us, so maybe we could use that to turn things to our advantage. I know for a fact Ruri is better when she is fighting with limited space, and Kayla's fighting style also benefits from having the enemy in narrow areas. Dammit…I just wish we outnumbered them.

I think about pulling my menu down and sending a message to Al, however I opt not to. Maybe I'm just overthinking things, maybe the fact that they stopped and then started walking again with us is just some kind of very unlucky coincidence.

"Does she like…" Kayla stops, "talk back a lot? Or is she more like a weird presence?"

"She does talk a lot whenever she is here…" I admit.

"Well that is a fact…" Mirai mutters.

I start speeding up the pace of my walk, I barely notice, but I turn my slow walking to an almost mild jog when Sinna pulls my left arm.

"Where are you going?" she asks, "You seem to be in a hurry."

"I just…" I stammer.

My pause allows me to see that the group behind us has once again stopped just as we did.

Fuck. No. No. No. No, this isn't good.

"Girls…" I murmur, "We should get moving."

"You also noticed them?" Kayla says as she looks over her shoulder.

Sinna starts looking around frantically after Kayla's sentence. She doesn't have the slightest clue of where to look. She looks ahead of us, to her sides and then she finally opts for looking behind, spotting the group of players.

"Why didn't you say anything?!" I yell.

"You didn't either…" Kayla complains, "I thought maybe I was just being paranoid, but they are following us aren't they?"

"We can try to lose them in the woods," Ruri suggests.

"It's just a small patch of trees, it would be impossible to lose them there," Kayla huffs.

"May-maybe we can climb up the trees!" Sinna says, her voice being plagued with a hint of fear.

Weak.

"What was that just now?" Mirai asks, appearing in front of me with a smile.

I shake my head and equip both my gauntlets. I stretch out my fingers and then relax.

Deep breaths…it's all about deep breaths.

Maybe, just maybe we can take them, we are good at fighting, and if we can't take them then at the very least we can hold them off until they back off or something. Dammit…I'm not thinking straight.

"Ok, we need to at the very least get to those trees then…" Kayla mumbles, "You guys ready?"

Ruri nods, shortly after I do the same and then take a look at Sinna who seems to be currently out of breath, she is actually gasping for it.

"I'm not…" she wheezes, "I'm not…I'm not…"

The group behind us starts running towards us, prompting Kayla and Ruri to start running as well. Sinna freezes over and with no other option left I get a hold of her arm and start pulling her along with me as I run behind Ruri and Kayla.

"The little runt is nothing but an annoyance…she just gets in the way," Mirai chuckles.

"Shut up!" I fume.

"Wh-what?" Sinna asks as she struggles to keep up.

"Nothing, nothing…just try to keep up sweetie, come on!" I say.

We make it into the small patch of trees, the shadows they cast once again washing off the warmth of the sun. Kayla and Ruri already have their weapons at the ready; Kayla holds her rapier which is already shining with a skill, while Ruri twirls her dagger around getting ready for an attack. I stop and finish pulling Sinna in front of me, she looks terrified and her legs won't stop shaking. I grab her sides and lift her into the air with surprising ease.

"What are you doing?!" she shrieks.

"You are going to stay up there alright?" I say.

Before she has any time to reply I throw her up and see her grab unto a really high branch. She pulls herself up and with wide eyes just stares down at me.

Deep breaths…deep breaths…

"Deep…breaths…" I groan as I clench my hands into fists.

"Your little breathing exercises are not going to help you right now!" Mirai screams, "Come on! Let's do it!"

"Aeri, you have to calm down, we got this," Kayla says.

"You calm down!" I scream.

"Uh oh…" Ruri mumbles.

"There they are, kill them!" shouts the player that is leading the group that was following us.

The four players enter the small patch of trees, my eyes confirm all of them are wearing black hoods, they are definitely LC. I immediately run forwards to reach the leader. I pull my right arm back and then let go to try and get to him. The bastard lifts his sword just in time to block my fist. I grunt and open my hand then close it around his blade. Moving my hand to the right I leave him exposed and throw a punch at his face with my left hand. I feel the sweet sensation of my knuckles practically crushing his nose and yank the sword out of his hand.

"Beat his face in!" Mirai orders.

Dropping my attacker's sword I reach out for the collar of his shirt and pull him back in to punch him again. I repeat the process one time, two times, three times, four times. I stop only at the sensation of a blade piercing my side. I bare my teeth and turn to the left to see a man with a short blade. His weapon is poking my side and it really pisses me off. I'm about to let go of my current target when both Kayla and Ruri start attacking the man with half his blade on my side.

Kayla dashes next to the man and quickly drives the whole length of her rapier in and out of the man's chest. Before moving out of the way she pulls the man towards her and then ducks, allowing Ruri to tackle the man to the ground with her dagger as the first point of contact.

"They are doing their job," Mirai seethes, "Now kill the bastard you are holding on to!"

"I'm on it," I say and let out a soft chuckle.

I push the man I'm holding on to into the ground and grab his head with both of my hands. I position my hands to have my thumbs just over his eyes and then push my fingers in to watch him twist and turn in discomfort. It won't blind him, but the sensation of having your eyes pushed in must not be a nice sensation.

I jerk my head to the side as I hear the sound of crystals crashing and shattering. Ruri and Kayla have successfully eliminated one of the enemy players; I smile as I see them effortlessly turn to the other two targets. The switch from an offensive tactic to a defensive one, instead of attacking relentlessly like they did with their first kill they are focusing more on parrying attacks and keeping their distance.

"You are having way too much fun with this poor soul, end him!" Mirai roars.

I pull my fingers out of the man's eye sockets and starts beating his face to a pulp. I alternate my punches, first left, then right, left, right. It takes me about ten seconds of punching, but he is finally dead and a hundred tiny pieces of shinning crystals appear before me.

I get back on my feet and turn just in time to see Ruri go for her target's legs, knocking him into the ground allowing her to get on top and stab her dagger dead center on the man's face.

"There's more of them coming!" Sinna screams from the tree tops.

Four other players are running towards us from the dirt road, all of them also donning black hoods and with their weapons at the ready.

Six…we can't take six of them. We just can't. I hear a set of steps behind me and turn around ready to throw a punch. As I'm using my feet to pivot around I see a familiar face with grey-ish hair smiling at me widely. He chuckles as I stop my fist, mere inches away from his face and leisurely adjusts his scythe over his shoulder.

"Man, it feels like it's been ages since I last saw you," he chuckles.

"Stop screwing around, Billfray," says another voice as a figure holding a spear runs past me.

"Aereth!" Sinna screams with joy.

Billfray takes a hold of my hand which is still just a breath away from his face and places a teleport crystal on my hand.

"You get out of here, I'll give some to everyone," he says.

"Why did they have to come by and ruin the fun!?" Mirai complains, sounding completely and utterly enraged.

"I'll be the last to leave, got it?" I answer.

"Alright then, we'll leave together," Billfray huffs and turns to Kayla and Ruri, "Hey, lovebirds! Catch!"

Aereth jumps at one of the trees and kicks himself off of it to gain more altitude. He points the blade of his spear down and crashes right on top of one of the other players. He doesn't kill him, but I'm more than sure that he caused some serious damage.

"Where's Sinna?" Billfray asks, sounding confused.

"Over here!" she shouts.

Billfray looks up and with a smile throws her a teleport Crystal.

"Aereth you two are ready to leave, go now!" Billfray orders.

"Alright!" Aereth answer back and rolls away just in time to avoid the attack of two men, "I'll follow you Sinna!"

"Teleport, Floria!" Sinna screams.

"Teleport, Florira!" Aereth yells, shortly after.

One of the players in black hoods takes out a crystal and thrusts it into the air. Billfray makes a small jump towards the man and with a full swing of his scythe cuts his hand clean off.

"You guys are not going anywhere!" he says, "Ruri, Kayla, you are up, I got this!"

"Teleport, Lindarth!" Kayla scoffs.

Ruri rolls back and springs back on her feet as she throws a couple of knives in the players' direction. She trips as she is trying to walk backwards, but just as she hits the ground she takes out her crystal.

"Teleport, Lindarth!"

I'm about to make my way to Billfray when he gets completely surrounded by enemies. This is bad, we are at a disadvantage, especially with the odds. Two against six isn't really a situation that is on our favor.

"Let's get out of here," I huff as my eyes dart around the players, unsure of who to focus on.

"About that…" he replies.

"What now?! Use your crystal dammit."

The LC members aren't attacking Billfray just yet and two of them are now turning to face me. It seems they want to keep me away from him.

"I thought I had enough crystals for all of us…" he chuckles.

I hear Mirai's faint laughter in the back of my head, but I shake my head as I try to refocus.

"This is not the time for a stupid joke like that," I growl.

"It's not a joke," he says softly, "I'm sorry, about this…please just go, alright?"

"No, we can get out I just have to…uh," I stammer, "I'll use bloodlust and then…shit…shit."

He laughs, and takes hold of his scythe with both hands. The blade shines brightly above his head and focusing hard on him I can see a faint smile on his face.

"This will be like a way to pay you back or something, you know for saving my ass on that boss room…when we met," Billfray says.

"No! No!" I roar, "Bloodlust!"

The gauntlets easily extend their reach on my body and immediately I feel my body burning up. By the time I move Billfray is already being attacked by four players. He manages to get a few hits in himself, but he is quickly overrun by the other players.

"Billfray!" I scream.

"Just get out of here!" he yells back, as he still tries to fight back.

"No! I'm not leaving you!" I answer as I drive my fist through the first player that approaches me.

I pull my hand out and with a quick punch push the bastard out of the way. I see an axe flying my way and raise my hand to take a hold of it. Sadly I miss the blade and watch it hit me in the shoulder.

"COME AND GET SOME YOU BASTARDS!" Billfray screams, still struggling to deal more damage than he is receiving.

Deep breaths…

"Deep fucking breaths!" I scream and kick the axe wielder away from me.

I yank the axe off my shoulder and throw it to the side. My health bar is about halfway consumed now. I'm about to dig into my pocket to fish out a health potion when I finally see Billfray get completely overrun. He is knocked to the ground and the group of four players concentrating on him waste no time in attacking him while he is down.

"Get out of here," Mirai huffs.

"But…I…Billfray," I squirm.

"GO!" she insists.

Billfray's body shatters and my knees buckle. I fall on my knees and almost without thinking I pull the crystal Billfray gave me out. I thrust it into the air.

"Teleport, Myujen!" I scream.

I feel the ground below disappear for a brief second and faster than I can blink my knees land on cold, soft snow. I press my hands against the snow and watch it melt as it comes in contact with my gauntlets. I'm groaning, annoyed by the sensation of the scars on my body. I deactivate bloodlust and lose all strength in my body. I allow my body to hit the snow, no longer having the extra warmth thanks to bloodlust I feel as the cold snow starts to embrace me.

"That's another friend gone, huh?" Mirai says.

I'm practically in a small puddle that my gauntlets managed to melt down and for an odd reason as I forcefully rub my face against the snow I feel thankful that I can't tell my tears apart from the cold water.

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

So my internet was refusing to work this morning so, this chapter is a little late because of that. I think I should look into changing ISPs...again. Nevertheless I'm sorry if ti seems like I take your reviews and messages into consideration to see who I'm going to kill. I really don't Billfray's death was planned long ago so this was nothing personal I swear!

**IC0: **YEAH ALF ARE DICKS. (I'm honestly a bit surprised they don't get that much of a spotlight as evil people in the Anime. I mean they aren't exactly bad people but they are a bit of a lesser evil cause of people being assholes.) Also geez, you make me blush, thank you so much for liking my fic the way you do haha. I did start this fic cause I was sort of unsatisfied with how the anime handled some things so I'm glad in a way that I'm able to convey that with my story! **OneTiredSloth: **I will keep it up! YEAHH! **jtgamer-aza: **Nah you are good, I also talk a lot to myself, and if we are crazy at least we are crazy TOGETHER! **Electronic Ink** **0: **ALL THIS LOVE FOR CRAZY AERI IS SO COOL. To be honest a probably enjoy more than I should whenever I write Aeri being all mental and stuff.

Welp that is all for this week. I need to stop playing so many video games and use my new found free time to actually finish writing this story haha... No promises though, however as you are probably tired of hearing, we are close to the end. While I'm starting to notice I might not be able to stick to my initial promise of my fic not going over 80 chapters...WE ARE GOING TO BE DONE SOON SO YEAH!

As always if you like what you read please leave a review! You can join the fanclub which seems to be compromised of a bout four people! (It's a super cool fanclub guys, come on.) I will see you all next week!


	76. Chapter 76 - Cinder

**Chapter 76 – Cinder**

**November/3****rd****/2024**

**Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Monster Arena**

**Aereth**

"Ladies and gentlemen!" The announcer yells with enthusiasm.

I sit up straight and cross my arms as I stare down into the Arena. I've been here about four times if I remember correctly. Three times to participate in the madness and once to watch. This marks the fifth time I've been in this particular place and the second I've come to watch. Players and NPCs alike crowd the seats to this place, all to watch players risk their lives for extra money, or in some cases rare event items.

I deeply dislike the concept of this whole arena. It's a high risk, low reward kind of thing. To be honest I have no reason other than to believe that this place only exists for the entertainment of those who come to watch. Maybe there's a player or two in the crowd who are morbidly waiting for someone to die inside this very arena.

"I'm happy to announce…no scratch that," the announcer coughs and then clears his throat, "I'm absolutely thrilled to announce that today we have a returning fighter! A very special one at that…"

"You really think it's true? You really think she is back?!" The girl besides me asks her friend.

"You saw the roster outside, she has to be! Who else has a name like that?" the friend replies.

"Oh my god! I'm so excited!"

"Cinder is making her grand return to our arena for her fight number sixty!" the announcer booms around the arena, "As most of you may know…fight number sixty marks the end of the Arena Fighter quest line. One quest line we haven't seen completed as of today!"

The crowd of both players and NPCs around goes wild. Whistling, shouting, and thrusting their arms in the air. I want to reject the idea that this Cinder is the reason as to why I'm here, sadly, I just can't. I know for a fact that this dumb show name "Cinder" belongs to Aeri, back when she used to fight along with Reginald in this arena. Reginald also had a show name, he was known as "Blaze".

"Sadly though…her partner Blaze will not be joining her," the man sounds off through the place, "YOU HEARD JUST RIGHT! She is taking this last fight all on her own! SO just for this one time, let me hear you say it people!"

"Big monsters!" the crowd screams, "One player!"

"ALL ODDS AGAINST HER!" The announcer finishes.

The wooden gate leading into the arena begins to crank and the crowd around me only grows louder. Chanting and screaming like crazies, almost as if they were trying to get the gate to rise faster. I happen to be seated in the area that gives me a wide view of the gate as it slowly rises. I can see a single silhouette behind it and I know exactly who it is.

"Just what are you trying to prove?" I mutter to myself.

As the gate finally opens Aeri slowly walks out into the arena. Her golden armor shining as the sun hits her body just right, reflecting an almost blinding light in my direction. I move my head just slightly in order to focus on her figure without being blinded. She has already equipped her gauntlets and even from far away I can see her arms twitch slightly.

I've seen that stance, the twitching included several times, but seeing it right now I can't help but to see it in new light. Ruri has just recently told me about what's been happening with Aeri. In a way I sort of suspected it. Her behavior seemed too erratic at times, but never did I imagine it would be something as troublesome as hallucinations. Let alone something that sounds so eerily similar to something in the vein of a personality disorder, I'm no doctor, but it sure sounds like a disorder of that kind. I no longer know if the woman I'm watching is the girl I know as Aeri or this other…girl.

"Our favorite red haired…uh, excuse me…" The announcer stops, sounding utterly confused by his own sentences, "Black haired beauty Cinder steps for one last time into the fray!"

Aeri keeps walking further into the Arena and once she finds herself standing in the very center she raises her right. Almost as if in command the crowd goes wild with cheering and screams.

"Cinder! I love you!" I hear.

"Cinder! Cinder! Cinder!" They chant.

I remember that from time to time people would recognize Aeri and Reginald, it always happened whenever we ate at a nearby pub after they were both done fighting. I never did watch any of their fights, I opted for staying outside, doing something else to distract Sinna.

"Let's get this started!" The announcer yells, "The monsters come into play!"

The sound of another gate slowly rising overpowers even the loudest cheers amongst the crowd. Out of the few times that I participated I never got to fight anything that proved to be a challenge. While the arena does throw the monsters at you in pairs I never fought something I couldn't handle. However, I did only get to my third fight into the quest line.

"Didn't the last player to attempt the last battle die?" I hear behind me in the crowd.

"Yeah man, heard the dude got obliterated in less than a minute."

"I'm sure she can handle it," a voice argues.

"What makes her so special?"

"Geez, I don't know she is just cool."

Foreboding comments.

The sound of the gate opening comes to an stop and what follows puts me a little on edge. Stomps, loud, heavy ones. I lean my body forwards in hopes of being able to see whatever is making the loud stomps. Whatever monster is generating the almost earthshaking stomps is still to come out of the gate and become visible in the arena. Changing my own focus to Aeri I see her suddenly raise her guard and strike a defensive stance with her lower body. A large tentacle-like appendage swirls out of the monster's gate and tries to crush Aeri. She manages to jump to the side and then starts walking back to avoid the tentacle's range.

Having failed its first attack the tentacle retreats back into the gate, the stomps resume and in a matter of seconds a massive beast emerges from the gate, followed by a smaller humanoid figure. The beast resembles a gorilla in shape, however it's the size of an elephant and it flaunts a set of horns the coil into the back of its head. Its skin resembles a tar-like texture and its right arm is nothing but a massive tentacle. The human looking thing behind the beast looks female, she wears a black dress with tattered ends, her face covered with what looks like a small golden cage, and a blue-ish veil gently flows in the air behind her head. She carries a golden bow and a massive quiver hangs from her hip.

Nothing about the particular set up seems fair. Both enemies seem to be quite capable at long range. The beast has a tentacle that can easily extend at least half across the arena. Add on top of that an archer who can easily pick her shots while Aeri is distracted by the beast. It's just not fair at all. Her best bet is to try and kill the archer before even trying to go against the beast.

Aeri's gauntlets suddenly extend their reach up to her shoulder and even from this far I can hear them clamp around her skin. Aeri's body begins shinning with bright scars. Almost every visible spot of skin across her armor is shining with straight lines of what appears to be damage, but I've seen her ability up close and know for a fact they are mere scars.

"What kind of skill is that?!"

"I don't know man…shut up alright? I'm trying to watch here…"

The giddy group of fans next to me is nothing but annoying. I uncross my arms and stand up from my seat. I'm about to start going down the steps that act as seats for the crowd when I feel a hand over my shoulder.

"Hey, come on man, sit down!" the owner of the hand huffs.

"Make me," I reply, while looking over my shoulder.

The young man behind me slowly retracts his hand from my body and with a scared expression sits back down. A smart move. I would like to avoid trouble today. I move down through the crowd, being careful to not bother anyone else as I make my way down. Soon enough I make it to the bottom, where a safety rail is all that divides me from a rather long drop into the arena.

Aeri makes her first attempt to attack and tries going for the beast first. Kind of a dumb move, I expected her to actually go for the archer at first, then again it's not like we've ever shared similar engagement tactics. Even when fighting simple mobs out in the field with her she always preferred to take the…straightforward approach.

The arena allows any spectators to both see the health of the players fighting and the health on the monsters they are trying to find off. As off right now Aeri's health is slowly being depleted due to Bloodlust. Bloodlust is usually as a last ditch effort by her, but right now she has chosen to use it first.

The beast swings it's tentacle in Aeri's direction, an attack she barely avoids by ducking under the appendage. To piss the beast off she drags her hand along the tentacle as she dodges it. She inflicts some damage on the beast, but not nearly enough to warrant that dumb action as necessary. I can tell she is laughing from the ever so subtle movement on her lips.

An arrow flies just under the beast's legs and nails Aeri on her left leg. Her leg gives in a little, but she recovers quickly as she yanks the arrow out. With her hands she breaks the arrow into two pieces and tosses them to the side, a smirk taking over her face. The beast pulls its tentacle arm back and once again tries to hit Aeri with it. Aeri lifts her hands up grabbing the tentacle just as it's about to hit her. She absorbs the blow and wastes no time in shredding apart the thing, tearing off piece after piece with amazing speed.

"She's doing it!" the announcer points out the obvious.

However, taking a closer look is all I need to realize Aeri actually finds herself at a disadvantage. I see the archer knock another arrow on her bow and fire it at Aeri who is currently busy tearing one of the beast's "arms" apart. The arrow hits her dead center on the chest, subtracting even more health from her already diminishing pool of health points. The arrow makes Aeri stagger, allowing what's left of the tentacle to push her into the ground. I close my eyes and flinch as I see this, this is not like her at all. Aeri is rash and doesn't always have the best strategy for battles, actually I consider there is a consistent lack of it whenever she wants to kill something, whether it be human or artificial. It's a bad way to go about things, yet it is the only way she knows how to operate. Reacting merely on impulse, thinking about things on the go, that's how Aeri fights. What I'm seeing right now is both a lack of any kind of strategy and also a complete lack of Aeri's usual fighting style, it's like she just doesn't care.

The remainder of the tentacle slowly coils around Aeri body and lifts her into the air before throwing her against the wall just under from where I'm standing. Her body is not even done slamming against the wall when two arrows nail both of her hands against it, basically crucifying her to the wall. The impact along with the arrows makes her health drop dangerously low to the fifty percent mark. The crowd gasps in surprise and what a few seconds ago were cheers of excitement and bravado are now mumbles of curiosity and expectation.

I wrap my hands around the safety rail and lean my body forwards, feeling discomfort, rage and uselessness all in the short span of a few seconds.

"What are you doing, girl…" I mumble to myself.

Looking down I see Aeri, it seems almost as if she has accepted defeat. She hangs her head in front of her and doesn't even try to free herself in the slightest. Her gauntlets retract back to their original size and I can hear sigh. This could very well be some sort of trick, but it doesn't feel like so. It feels like she's given up. I don't like it.

The beast slowly approaches Aeri's suspended body. She lifts her head up a little, she sees the beast approaching her yet she doesn't move. She is completely aware of the situation and she is going to let it happen.

"What are you doing?!" I yell, "Do you want to die?!"

She groggily looks up, right at me. She seems surprised; after all I'm sure she wasn't aware that I followed her here today. However, her face just tells me that she was not expecting me at all. I'm probably the last person she actually expected to care about her.

"Stop staring and move!" I scream, "Move!"

"Come on!" someone else yells behind me.

"You can do it!" another voice sounds off.

"You have to live dammit!" I growl.

The beast readies its normal looking arm to punch Aeri into the wall, but Aeri pulls her hand through the arrows' length to free herself. She lands on her feet and jumps up in the air with her right fist shining brightly. She screams and meets the beast's fist with her own, a strong surge of air hits me right in the face as a clinking sound pierces the crowds cheers. Aeri grabs unto the beasts fist and pulls herself over it.

The archer knocks another arrow on her bow and fires at Aeri as she is still airborne. This time Aeri turns her body and with lot of luck and immaculate timing she grabs the arrow heading to her body with her right hand. Aeri finally reaches the beast's face and holds on with her claw like grip with her left hand. She pulls herself up and stabs the arrow she caught into the beast's left eye. Now holding on from the arrow burrowed in the beast's eye she pushes her left hand into the other eye before letting go and dropping to the floor. She stumbles slightly, but the first thing she does after touching the ground is head straight for the archer.

"Cinder! Cinder!" people keep chanting.

The archer is capable; however I doubt she is nearly as fast as Aeri is. If Aeri's head is back on the game she will avoid getting hit, I'm sure she will.

The beast blindly stomps the ground behind Aeri, it would seem it no longer is able to see properly. I'll never know if that was in Aeri's plan, but that's the beauty of it, she reacted according to the situation and made the best out of it. The archer fires yet another arrow at Aeri, one that she merely dodges due to literally tripping over her own feet. Aeri keeps her momentum by putting her hands in front of her before actually falling and she starts running at the archer like some sort of animal, on all fours.

I chuckle and smile a little as I watch her go.

She gets to her target just as she is knocking an arrow on her bow. Aeri takes hold of the arrow and turns it around, driving it through the archer's chest. The archer's health drops dramatically; it would seem she is quite weak. Aeri yanks the bow off of her hands and hits the owner over the head with it. The archer falls to the ground, seemingly in pain. Still holding the bow in one hand Aeri reaches down and rips the quiver off the archer's hip, she then proceeds to viciously step over her head. Stomp after stomp the archer's health drops little by little until she dies.

Aeri bends a knee and takes an arrow out of the quiver. She knocks it on the bow and with incredible ease pulls the arrow all the way back. Her arms are shaking a bit, despite her strength I doubt she has used a bow. I actually don't think there is such a player weapon in existence in the game. Just as she is about to let go of the arrow, the bow's string breaks. Furious Aeri tosses the now broken bow away and takes all the remaining arrows in the quiver.

She takes her time as the beast still happens to be aimlessly flailing its arms and body around. She holds about three arrows in each hand and bites on the rest with her mouth. I consider this a particularly funny image in a way as she is trying to hold on to about seven arrows with only her mouth.

A part of me is getting excited and I'm having a hard time keeping it inside.

"Come, do it!" I scream, "Kill that thing!"

I see her turn to me with a mouth full of arrows and even despite of those I can clearly make out her grin. She nods and speeds off towards the beast. As she is closing in on the thing she jumps into the air and twisting her body she pulls her right arm back and with the help of a skill throws the arrows in her hand with unbelievable strength. The arrows fly through the air with almost as much speed as if they had been fired from the bow the enemy was using. The first set of arrows hit the monster in the back making it turn around to the source of the pain with an angry growl.

The beasts smash the ground with its fist in Aeri's direction; however its aim is still very far off. With a simple step to the side Aeri is able to steer clear from danger and ready her other arm to throw the arrows she is still holding. This time she pulls her left arm back and I see brief light envelop her hand as she throws the arrow. Another set of arrows hit the beast, this time embedding themselves around its face.

The damage of the arrows is surprisingly strong on the monster but that still leaves Aeri with over half a health bar to deplete in order to kill it. She takes more arrows out of her mouth, only leaving a single one for her to bite unto. She holds three arrows in each hand again.

She runs towards the beast but this time when she is close she jumps at it. She lands on its shoulder and wastes no time in impaling a set of arrows on its neck. The monster reaches up to grab her, however reacting quickly Aeri stabs the other set of arrows on its hand as it's reaching out for her. She then jump into the air once again, she reaches for the last arrow in her mouth, and throws the last arrow at the beast's face, getting him right in-between the eyes.

"Bloodlust!" she screams just as she lands.

I grip the rail in front of me tighter as I know what using that ability in close succession does. Aeri's remaining health points start dropping fast and she still has to make work of half the beast's health. Even if she rips the thing apart, I doubt she has enough time.

Despite my assumptions she starts doing just that. Tearing the monster apart, piece by piece. She starts with its legs. Ripping out chunks of each one, and rolling out of the way as it gets ready to stomp the ground. After leaving the legs only visible as a mess of red damage effects she moves on to the arms. She climbs the beast from behind and starts ripping pieces out, starting with its shoulders.

I can see the desperation in her attempt to kill the thing as quickly as she is physically able to. She is grunting and screaming, loud enough for me to hear, which probably means it's loud enough for everyone in the arena to hear.

As she finishes utterly destroying the thing's arms she jumps back and her entire right arms starts shinning a bright shade of red. Her health drops below twenty percent and I can only hope her next attack will eat through the enemies remaining twenty five.

She runs one last time towards the beast. She holds her right arm with her left hand, as if it were weighing her down. She struggles to get speed, but the closer she gets the faster she seems to be going. She stops a few feet away from the beast and screams.

"Over here!"

The monster turns around and lunges in Aeri's direction. She moves forward allowing the beast's fist to graze her head and throws a punch directly at the beast's chest. The glow on Aeri's arm intensifies, shinning brighter and brighter to the point it practically looks like lava. Seconds later the monster disappears from sight and Aeri drops to her knees, deactivating bloodlust and leaving her with less than five percent of her health to spare. She collapses in the middle of the arena and after a few solid seconds of silence the crowd goes crazy.

* * *

Dispite her fanbase it's amazing to see how many people are actually scared of "Cinder". Since the arena started to clear out I made my way down to the participant entrance of the arena. I was the only one there along with about five other people that wanted pictures with Aeri. It was only me and five other people who were willing to risk interacting with her. It makes me chuckle for some reason. These people don't know Aeri as I do; they would be surprised she can be more meek than scary at times. Meek might not be the right word though. We waited for an hour, then two, and then they left. I stayed behind for an extra hour.

I go down the tunnel that leads to both the locker rooms and the arena floor. All of the locker room doors are closed except one. A single door is just slightly open and there seems to be light coming from the inside. I got close to the door and knock on it.

"Leave me alone…" a voice replies weakly.

"It's me," I answer.

There's a bit of a stretched out silence before her answer, but thankfully she replies.

"Come in…"

I open the door and walk in to see Aeri standing still in front of a mirror. The mirror reflects her whole body, which she just so happens to only barely be dressed by her underwear. She does have her gauntlets equipped as well, which just makes the whole situation feel a tad bit odder. I close the door behind me and watch her trace a scar that goes all the way from her navel up to her shoulder with her sharp finger.

"Did I ever tell you…" she says softly, "about these scars?"

"Something to do with the last enemies you kill," I answer.

She turns around allowing me to see a big messy scar on her face. As if the last thing she killed had its face bashed in. I believe that particular scar would belong to the archer, given how Aeri dispatched her.

"That's only…partially true," she answers.

"What do you mean?" I ask, crossing my arms.

She chuckles softly and takes a healing crystal into her hands. She activates it, effectively restoring all her health points, the crystal disappearing in the process.

"These are only the scars of the last few players I have killed," she mumbles.

I'm unable to generate a reply other than a slow nod in her direction. She laughs at my reaction and takes a few steps towards me.

"Tell me…" she says, "Even if by some miracle I live to make it out of this world…how am I supposed to live with myself?"

I swallow my spit and clear my throat before trying to answer.

"Aeri, you should proba-"

"Bloodlust," she says softly.

Her gauntlets start climbing her forearms, slowly spreading their reach upwards until finally clamping down on her shoulders. As soon as I hear the clamping noise I see Aeri's body shine with all kinds of scars.

Straight lines, long and short ones, what seem like scratches, big spots where her skin seems to have stretched out in order to rip something apart. Her face is also filled with them, all of them shinning thanks to her skill being active.

"I did all of this…because I thought it was the right thing to do…" she says and grabs her own neck, softly rubbing shinning lines that circle her neck, "Yet, I can't get it out of my head at times, that these…these were all people, people I consciously decided to kill. What does that make me Aereth?"

I take a deep breath.

"It makes you a killer," I answer.

Her eyes widen as I'm quite sure those words were not the answer she was looking for. She was looking for me to comfort her, and I will. In my own way.

She purses her lips and deactivate bloodlust before sitting on a bench in the middle of the room. She covers her face and I can hear her taking deep breaths into her being.

"But so am I," I add.

She drops her hands from her face and raises her head a little bit. She looks at me with teary eyes, however she is yet to let a single tear roll down her eyes.

"And we did what we did in order to survive in this world, didn't we?" I ask.

She nods slowly.

"Look, I'm not saying what you did was right, neither what I did…" I pause, "but our current circumstances aren't normal, not by a longshot. There are people killing each other here constantly, with even less of a reason to do so than you."

"What are you trying to say?" she asks.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is…" I mutter, "Even if you are a killer, I don't necessarily think you are a bad person, and I'm pretty sure everyone back home shares that opinion."

She chuckles and wipes her eyes.

"You…you are so odd," she says.

"How so?"

"You try so hard to look like this really cold person," she laughs, "You are nothing but warm, mushy stuff in the inside."

I laugh and sit next to her.

"Can I ask you something?" I say.

"Sure…" she sighs.

"Why did you give up at the beginning of that fight?"

She sits up a bit straighter and rests her hands on her lap. It would appear she doesn't want to answer the question, but all she is doing is buying herself some time before answering.

"I…wanted to die," she admits.

"Why?"

"You know...what haunts me the most is not the people I have killed," she stops, "but all the ones that have died because of me. All my friends...our friends"

"Billfray did what he did in order to save us," I state, "He knew what would happen, but he chose to save us, it wasn't your fault."

In the corner of my eye I can see her embrace herself with her arms.

"What made you change your mind?" I ask, "What made you want to live?"

"You," she answers softly, "If you hadn't been there…I would've completely stopped trying."

"I'm glad I was here then," I smile.

Aeri stands up and drags down her menu. She equips a set of town clothes, a simple skirt with a yellow top and a sweater. She unequips her gauntlets and turns to me with a smile.

"I'm glad you were," she says and extends her hand to me, "Let's go home."

* * *

Crysina here!

I know that maybe the action in this chapter feels somewhat slow, but that's just how Aereth is guys. I like to think he is the most...calm and thoughtful of all my characters. Not much to complain about this week, I will say it took me hours to come up with the title for this chapter, but I'm more than glad with what I ended up naming it.

**IC0: **Yeah, something else the novels and anime do mention, but never bother in mentioning again. There's a case of yet another sleeper agent in Alfiehm, but that is only ever mentioned in one of the mangas. SO yeah I like to think more than a handful of LC members survived. **OneTiredSloth: **I certainly hope to avoid killing every single character that my readers love. Surprisingly As I go I come to find out that people love a lot the characters I honestly never expected them to. **Aisake: **I would like to say it's purely not intentional, but I would be lying. In order to make a death meaningful, I have to make you guys like someone haha. BUT IN ALL HONESTY I WAS NEVER EXPECTING SO MUCH PEOPLE TO LOVE BILLFRAY! **Electronic Ink 0: **It makes me sad as well I swear, I have this character sheet with all my characters info and stuff and it breaks my heart to see so many of them crossed out and having to replace their "Status" to "Dead". **jtgamer-aza: **I'm sorry for sucking ; - ; I hope to see some of your reviews in the future though. Thank you so much for your support, I will try not to kill any more reader favorites in the future!

Well that's it for this week. AS ALWAYS! If you like what you read please leave a review, one of my favorite parts about uploading is doing these little replies to your reviews, it's like a little conversation! I will see you all, next week!


	77. Chapter 77 - I'm Sorry

**Chapter 77 – I'm Sorry**

**November/6****th****/2024**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House**

**Elina**

"…I guess that's why I'm recording this thin-" I stop mid-sentence and set the light green crystal over the desk, "That's not right…no."

I make sure the crystal is no longer recording and shift a little in my seat. Slowly I place both of my hands over the desk and sigh. My heart is racing, I expected that it would be hard for me to record something like that, but I never thought it would be this hard. I have to do it though, one way or another.

I nod at myself, I'm trying to trick myself, give myself a little morale boost, even if it sounds dumb, it should help me a little. I grab the crystal once again and activate it to keep recording my message.

"I guess this is more for me tha-" I stop yet again, this time however due to a knock on the door.

I turn off the crystal for a second time and in a bit of a hissy fit I slam it against the desk.

"Come in…" I whine.

As I hear the door opening I reach to the sides of the desk and open one of the drawers. I stand up and throw the crystal inside. Turning around rather quickly I make sure to close the drawer with my foot. Finally facing the door reveals that it was Esra who decided to knock.

"Hey," she says shyly, "I…I was just wondering how you were doing, you've been in here for the better part of the day."

"Ah, yeah, I…uh," I open my inventory and take out a sweater I had been working on in the past few days, "I've just been trying to finish this."

I awkwardly show her both the partially finished sweater and my knitting needles. Telling her what I was really doing would just put her on edge, and that's the last thing I need right now. Her eyes seem to be very distracted by my sweater and she walks into the room, closing the door behind her.

"It's really cute, " she says, "How are you doing it?"

She seems to be completely in trance by my crappy half-done sweater, it's kind of cute of her. I know for a fact that Esra is well versed in many areas that other players aren't. For example, she is just one beast of a cook, she has above average straining and she is very good at crafting with wood. However, I happen to be better at making clothes than her, and whenever she has time or sees me making something she is sure to ask me about it.

She is getting closer to me, clearly without noticing she is already more than halfway into the room when she stops all of the sudden.

"I'm sorry!" she yelps, "Well, I already checked up on you…I'll be leaving now."

"I'll show you," I say with a smile, "You look too interested for me just to shoot you down."

"Really?" she gasps in surprise.

I nod and with a few steps get to the edge of my bed. I sit down and pat down a small spot next to me to signal her over. Wasting no time she takes out what looks like part of a sleeve along with her needles and sits next to me. She just looks so excited; I figure I must look the same whenever I ask her to teach me something in the kitchen.

"It'll be easy, seeing how you have something started," I say.

"Yeah," she giggles, "I was kind of making this for Sinna, but then I realized I probably made the Sleeve a little too long for her…so I guess this is for me now."

She reaches for my sweater and rubs the material in-between her fingers. Her already amazed look changes to complete awe along with a high pitched squeal.

"What kind of yarn are you using?" she asks, "This feels amazing, it's so soft."

"It's just this thing I got from Ruri's tailor," I say, "It's supposed to be super rare or something, had to pay a lot for it."

"Oh, that scary woman on floor forty eight?"

I chuckle a bit.

"She isn't scary."

"She totally is, once I went to her store to browse because Ruri wouldn't shut up about her and she was hounding me all the time I was there," she explains.

The small description of her experience does in fact sound like a quick look around Ashley's store. Ashley is certainly odd, but she has the best materials and clothes I have ever seen for sale. There's a reason as to why her stuff is so expensive and that is her excellent craftsmanship.

"That does sound like her," I laugh, "She has great stuff though."

She keeps touching the sweater and nods.

"Yeah, I'll be sure to swing by her place soon, maybe actually buy something this time."

We are getting side tracked, but it hardly hurts, I enjoy talking with Esra whenever I get the time. She always has something to say, or a story to share. Even from spending most of her time inside the house she often comes up with funny or interesting anecdotes.

"Alright, let me show you how to start with the chest of the sweater," I say.

"Oh, yes!" she exclaims, recognizing our conversation had moved us a bit out of focus, "Please do."

She stares intensely at my hands as I explain step by step how to transition from the sleeve to the chest of the sweater. The thing about making clothes here is that making them requires the real life steps to making any kind of clothing. The only difference are the stats that are awarded to the piece of clothing once you are done making it, and all of that rides in what level your particular craftsmanship is at. No matter if you made a beautiful sweater or jacket it will have low attributes if your level isn't high enough. So even if it's perfect it will become a low level piece of gear if you don't have a high level at making clothes.

"Wait, wait," she says, "Could you go back one step?"

"Sure," I reply.

I took up making clothes to distract myself, in a way I'm still doing it right now. Back when I barely knew how to defend myself, and sometimes even opted out of various quests and such. I had to take up some kind of hobby, that's how I found out about making clothes. The whole activity itself has become some sort of nostalgia switch over the years.

Whenever I make clothes I think back, back when things used to be easier, simpler, and safer. Back when everyone was alive, back when I hadn't experience any of the cruel things this world had to offer. Back when I met I fearless leader, when I met the person I fell in love with, when I met that girl in the dinner of my inn only to find out she left my friends to fend off monsters by themselves. From time to time the thought brings tears to my eyes, but it's hard not to let it do that. Good, happy moments are fleeting and that is a crushing universal truth, or at least it's what I've grown to realize in here. At least my memories are forever, that way I can cherish whatever little semblance of happiness and hope I ever had.

"Ok, I get it now!" Esra says, "Thank you so much!"

I shake my head quickly as I might've gotten lost in my own thoughts for a second.

"Yeah, no worries," I say.

She stands up from the edge of the bed and puts away her needles and the part of the chest she just worked on. She pats down her long skirt and places both of her hands over her apron.

"I'll start working on dinner," she says, "say, as a way to pay you back…would you like something in particular today?"

The word "stew" starts jumping all around inside my head. She makes killer pork stew, or rather…whatever inside here that tastes like pork. I bring both of my hands to my chin in order to appear a little thoughtful.

"You know…" I stall, fully knowing what I want to ask her to make, "if it isn't too much trouble…"

"Yeah?" she asks with a big smile.

"Can you make pork stew?" I beg her, holding my hands together as I bow my body a little.

"Sure thing," she answers, "I'll get started right away."

"Thank you," I say, happiness engulfing my words.

She leaves my room, her frilly outfit swaying from side to side. There are a few things I always wanted to ask her, most of them have to do with how she takes this maid role so seriously. I guess I will have to keep those questions to myself. I push myself off the edge of the bed and store the sweater I will never complete back into my inventory. I reach for the drawer where I left the crystal I was using to record a message and pull it open. I watch the crystal roll a little and hit one of the walls of the drawer. I'm staring at it, trying to avoid the idea that I have to finish recording my words.

Breathing out through my nose I push the drawer to a close and head for the exit of my room. I push the double doors open and walk my way down the small hallway to where the handrail that overlooks the foyer is located. I look down and see Aeri talking to Sinna by the door. I can't make out that much of their conversation, but Sinna looks kind of giddy while talking to Aeri.

"Eli!" I hear a scream coming from the stairs.

Ruri.

"Geez shut up!" A voice echoes behind the first.

Kayla.

"Eli! Eli!" The first voice starts desperately screaming.

I hear a set of footsteps loudly stomping up the stairs.

"Ah!" Ruri yells, "Let go of my hair!"

I approach the stair and make my way down a few of the steps to find Kayla pulling on Ruri's hair as Ruri is pinching her cheeks.

"Let go," Kayla orders.

"You first!"

"Hey," I giggle, "What's going on?"

"Eli!" Ruri turns her head in surprise, pulling Kayla's cheek to the right in the process.

Kayla yanks on Ruri's hair as a proper reaction and they let go after they both realize they hurt each other. Ruri turns around quickly and fixes her hair.

"Eli, Eli!"

"Yes?"

"Back me up on this," she starts, "Is it true or not that Kay-"

Kayla quickly covers Ruri's mouth with her hands and starts pulling her down a few steps.

"Don't mind her, haha," she laughs exaggeratedly.

I follow them down the steps as Ruri struggles to get Kayla's hands out of the way. We reach the first landing of the stairs and Kayla is still trying really hard to drag Ruri out of sight. Finally setting herself free the ashen haired girl runs towards me and sets herself behind me. She is using me as some sort of human shield between her girlfriend and herself.

"I swear to god Ruri!" Kayla yells, her cheeks blushing a little.

"Say, say Eli," Ruri whispers close to my ear.

The amount of times she's said my name now without actually saying anything is getting a tad bit ridiculous.

"Yes, I am Eli," I joke.

She chuckles briefly and wraps her arm around me, now moving to my right side instead of hiding behind me. It's just exactly at times like this when I feel particularly short. It's not like she towers above me, but my height barely reaches her jaw.

"Now, is it true or not that Kayla used to act like a princess?!" she asks as she points her finger straight at Kayla.

Kayla is now blowing up her cheeks which are a bit red; she crosses her arms and looks away in clear embarrassment. I start laughing as I do remember the way she used to act quite clearly. She used the corniest of language back then, and she also dressed the weirdest ways in order to go along with her persona. She always had a dress on, where it to lounge around or for fighting.

All of her behavior was very classy, but even from the start it felt somewhat forced. It wasn't until she started to go out with Ruri that she started to change. Not to mention that a few weeks after she admitted to the fact that all the acting like a princess and stuff was just something she had always done for online games.

I feel a bit of an evil smile crawling over my face.

"Oh surely, you are mistaken," I tease, putting up a bit of a posh accent, "Ruri, dear, Kayla is incapable of such things."

"Ohohoho," Ruri laughs, also in a teasing tone, covering part of her mouth with a lady like posture, "Heavens, you are right, how crude of me to make such accusations!"

Kayla uncrosses her arms and storms off to her room.

"You guys are not even doing it right!" she yells.

Kayla opens the door and slams it behind her once she is inside. I exchange a few looks with Ruri and we both burst in laughter. After a few seconds of nonstop laughter my stomach starts hurting a little. I sit down on one of the steps and keep laughing a bit.

"That was great," Ruri laughs as she sits next to me, "I'll probably have to apologize to her later though."

"I'm sure she'll forgive you," I manage to reply.

"Yeah," she breathes out and rests her back on the rest of the steps, "I haven't seen you all day, have you been doing something?"

Of course I have, however it's not something I can just tell you my sweet perverted friend. I clear my throat and rest both of my hands over my lap.

"I overslept, and since Al isn't home I just decided to try and finish some of my knitting," I say.

"Heh, knitting," she chuckles.

"What's funny about it?"

"It's just…" she struggles, "It's like when I hear what Esra does to keep herself busy, it's kind of odd."

Hearing that something seems odd from the queen of oddness herself is quite…odd. I laugh and lean forwards a little, turning my head to her.

"Odd…how exactly?" I ask.

"Elina, we are in a world where you can go out and battle creatures you've only heard of in books, movies and well…other games. Where you can run faster than you ever thought possible, jump higher than you will ever be able to…" she explains, "Yet, Esra decides to be a maid, do the cooking, the cleaning, and you choose to stay at home and knit."

"Huh…I never thought of it like that," I say, "I guess you are right. Things haven't been ideal lately…"

Of course she is, when you put it like that what both Esra and I do sounds very odd, stupid in fact. Why do such trivial things when you could be doing something amazing? Why stay home and knit when you could go out and stare at incredible vistas, floating islands, snowy ridges as far as your eyes can see? All of these populated with fantastical beings that don't exist in the real world.

I guess I've always been like this…boring if you will. If anything, being trapped her gave me the perfect excuse not to be, and yet…I still am. I can fight monsters, I can get stronger, and I can…walk, run, and jump. Considering all those things, I still choose to stay and knit. That's just who I am I guess.

"I…I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that," Ruri apologizes, "I know things have been…sorry."

"Don't worry, I didn't mean to make you sulk as well," I say, "It's just that, knitting is kind of special to me, it reminds me of a time where...just a better time."

Ruri nods and stands up from the steps.

"I know what you mean," she says softly, "I'll go apologize to Kayla now, haha, don't want her to be mad at me for dinner."

I nod at her and she leaves to her room. I stand up and take another look down the foyer. Sinna is still talking Aeri's ear off by the door. This time I'm able to catch some more of their conversation.

"And then he jumped into the air and hit the monster!" she explains with exaggerated hand motions.

I walk down the stairs just in time for the main door to open. Al walks in, looking tired, but I know him well enough that he is actually fed up with something. He closes the door as he enters and pinches the bridge of his nose before sighing.

"Mr. Guild Leader!" Sinna exclaims, "Welcome back!"

"Hey, Sinna," he replies with a bit of a forced smile.

"You alright?" Aeri asks.

"Yeah, yeah," he says, "I'm fine, just tired."

"Any news from Asuna?" she asks.

"Yeah, bad ones," he says, "She is going back to the KoB, apparently the boss in floor seventy five is giving them a lot of trouble…wiped out half the scouting party."

"Geez…" Aeri says, "I guess we chose a good time to stop doing those, huh?"

Al stares at her with a rather angry look, I take it he doesn't like her comment in the slightest. Aeri shrugs and looks away. Immediately her eyes widen and she holds her head in annoyance.

"Is…she here?" Al asks.

"I…uh…yeah, she is just being annoying," Aeri admits, sounding embarrassed.

"Go away!" Sinna yells from the top of her lungs.

The small girl immediately steps in front of Aeri, spreading her arms as if shielding her. Aeri smiles and sets her hand on top of Sinna's head.

"Thank you," Aeri says softly.

I feel the stairs shake a little and turn around, Aereth barely avoids hitting me by jumping to the side.

"Sorry, didn't see you there," he says.

"Don't worry," I say, "You heading off somewhere?"

"Yeah, kind of," he answers.

Sinna is suddenly right next to me and she is pouting at Aereth, she blows up her cheeks and gets a hold of his right arm.

"What took you so long?" she asks.

"I just wanted to take some stuff with us," he tries to excuse himself, "I didn't even take that long, come on."

"You took hours!"

"It's only been like ten minutes, Sinna," Aeri defends Aereth as she walks up to us.

"Come on, come on!" Sinna says as she struggles to pull Aereth behind her, "It's gonna get dark soon! I wanna give flowers to Billfray before that!"

Sinna turns her body to also take hold of Aeri and starts to, with all her might, pull them behind her towards the door of the house. As they exit the house, both Aeri and Aereth are holding Sinna's hands. A sweet image. Those three have an odd relationship. Sinna is really dependent on both of them and in a way both Aeri and Aereth seem to be a little dependent of her as well.

Esra comes out of the kitchen, she looks to be in a hurry, but stops once she realizes it's only Al and I in the room.

"I wanted to tell them to wait a bit," she says, "Dinner is going to be ready in a bit…"

Al finally detaches himself from the door and starts approaching me.

"We'll wait for them," Al says, "It's not like we are in a hurry."

"Alright, Master," Esra says and goes back into the kitchen.

"Welcome home," I say softly.

He smiles at my words and picks me up from me feet to give me a tight squeeze. I squirm just slight, but also wrap my arms around him.

"It's good to be back," he breathes, "I don't enjoy going to the KoB headquarters at all."

"Was it at least worth it?" I ask.

"No…" he sighs and lets go of me, "There's no more new info on Laughing Coffin members, there's been some sightings, but that's all…sightings."

It's hard to support him at times like this, I can be here, by his side, but that won't help our problems. If he is tired of these LC guys, I'm doubly tired.

"You want to rest for a bit?" I ask.

"Nah, it's ok, I'll help Esra with the table," he says, "I'll come for you when everyone's back, they shouldn't take long."

I nod and slowly start going up the steps of the stairs. This might just give me the perfect excuse to finish what I was trying to do with the crystal. However, I feel even more conflicted than before. I was being selfish at the beginning, only thinking of him, I will have to re-do the recording, all of it.

I make it to my room rather quickly and lock the door behind me. Then I rush to the desk and open the drawer where I left the crystal. It's still there, in the empty drawer. I pull it out and hover my right index finger over it.

"Delete recorded message?"

I think about it for a few seconds, but it feels like longer goes by, I stare at the cross and circle floating just below the question. I press the circle to delete my message and feel an urgent need to breathe. I breathe in deeply and clear my throat.

"Message deleted, start recording?"

I press the circle once again and remain silent for the better part of a minute.

"This is even harder than the first time I tried recording this," I say and gently place the recording crystal over the desk, "Where to start…"

I chuckle for a second, trying to calm myself down.

"I love you, Al" I say, "I hope you know that…through thick and thin, always, please remember that."

I cough, probably because I'm feeling nervous. I'm about to do something real stupid and I'm recording this for whatever comes after that, which I'm sure will not be a nice outcome…at least for me that is.

"By the time you hear this, I will be gone," I say and pause, "Ah geez, that sounds horrible…it's not like it's going to be nice, but by the time you hear this I will have already quit the guild and…be nowhere in sight. I have chosen to put myself out there, in hopes that I can make everyone live a better life, a life without fear. Once I explain my plan I know you will find it stupid, you'll probably think it won't work and you are right…it might not, but I'm willing to give it a shot."

I pull the chair close to the desk and sit myself down.

"This is all I have left to put my hope on," I sigh, "As of late nothing has been going well, people getting hurt, our friends dying...thinking about it it's been going bad since quite a long time ago. I want to put a stop to it and this is the only thing I can possibly think of. I expect to be contacted by Klaus or that other man from the LC, maybe I can strike a deal with them, get them to leave you all alone in exchange of…me. I will do as they say as long as no other harm comes to you or anyone else. I'm willing to make this sacrifice."

Somewhere in my mind I really expect this to work, I really do. Of course I see all the scenarios, I see the scenario where Klaus kills me out of spite, I see the scenario where I'm forced to do everything they say in order to keep them away from my friends. I have thought about it and I'm no longer willing to be living in fear. This is the only thing I can think of. It's stupid, dumb and uncertain…but it's all I've got.

"I beg you, do not come looking for me, whatever happens. In the best of scenarios you will all be left alone…and that's what I'm hoping for. I hope that all of you, maybe even myself live to see the end of this game…just like you promised," I state, in the corner of my eye I can feel a small tear run down my cheek, "Today I realized I was being…kind of mean at recording this, only for you. It's cruel to leave everyone else without a goodbye, without a word, without explaining myself. So please show this to everyone as it will be my parting words for everyone, for my friends, for the people I love the most in my heart. I'm sorry."

Tears are now running down my cheeks, but to my own surprise I manage to keep my tone, not letting any other feeling seep into my words.

"Esra, I'll keep with me a ton of questions I always wanted to ask you, some regard your cooking and others are just purely about you and your personality. I'm sorry, but I just find you a bit quirky. I'll miss your food and chatting with you, teaching you how to knit…all of that," I take a another deep breath and wipe my tears, "I never got to talk a lot with you Aereth, but you are a great man, even greater person, even if you don't like recognizing it. I thank you for helping me through hard times and thank you even more for keeping one of my best friends safe when she decided to part ways with us."

I know they didn't meet right away, but I'm more than sure that one of the reasons as to why Aeri is alive right now has to be Aereth. I'm absolutely certain that even against her…or his, he has helped her in a way.

"Ruri and Kayla, I really have to say that whenever I see you two together I can't help but to feel all warm and fuzzy inside. You two are just made for each other, and it shows. Kayla I've known for longer and trust me Ruri and I can see you make her happy, you make her be a better person, you make her be honest with herself…and what kind of friend would I be if I didn't find joy in the happiness of my friends," I laugh, "It's even better because it's two of my friends which find themselves in this happiness."

I suddenly feel very uncomfortable on the chair I'm sitting at it. I'm unable to tell if I'm uncomfortable just because of the way I'm sitting or if it's something about what I'm doing. Then again, it could be a combination of both.

"Sinna, I'm sure it will be harder for you to understand, you are a sweet girl, and I'm happy I got to spend time with you playing and talking. Maybe we'll see each other in the future, maybe it'll be in real life, out of this game, I surely hope so…I really do. That goes for everyone," I chuckle.

That leaves only Aeri to address, I have a lot of stuff I want to say to her, but it's not like I can stay here recording for hours. The others are probably on their way back, and I can't stay here all day…after all I've been here for most of it.

"Aeri…I know you are still sort of ashamed of looking me in the eye, but even with all that's happened I want you to know that I love you. You are a dear friend. I still remember the day I meet you in that inn," I can't help but to laugh out loud at the memory I evoke, "You looked rather nervous and torn about something, if only I knew that was because you left Al and Daath to face some powerful mobs. Look at how that turned out though, I like to think that your addition to our little group is what kickstarted the events that would eventually turn us into a guild. If it weren't because of you we would probably have stayed as a sad group of three people."

I would've never been able to meet a lot of wonderful people. Even if they are gone I'm glad I met them, I'm happy I got blessed with the chance to meet them.

"Owl, Kayla, Kato, Esra, Ruri, Reginald, Siren, Hotoka, Twyla, Aereth, Sinna, Billfray," I say and stifle a bit, "Thank you so much for letting me met all those wonderful people. I will forever keep each and every single one of them in my heart."

I turn around surprised as I hear the door trying to be opened. The jiggling and pushing on the doors suddenly stop and a knock follows.

"You alright?" Al asks, "Dinner is ready and Aeri messaged me, they are on their way back."

"Yes!" I say a bit high pitched, "I'll be there in a second!"

"Alright, see you downstairs!" he yells back.

I look over at the crystal in the desk; it is still glowing in a teal shade. It is still recording, but I no longer have time to cut any content, so the little interruption will have to be in the message.

"Al…I started the first message with only you in mind, and I realize that was a mistake, as I can't leave you all only apologizing and telling all of these things to you. I'm too much of a coward to tell you and the others to the face, after all if I did, you would all stop me, I guess that's why I'm recording this…" I stop as I find myself just where I started despite going back and redoing the message, "I'm sorry everyone, I really am. I can only hope my idea pans out as I'm hoping it will. I love you all…I'm sorry."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Boy, I had a hard time writing this. Half cried while finishing it. This is it guys, home stretch. There are still a few chapters to go, but that's it...just a few more. I'm particularly fond of this chapter because of the things Elina talks about. I like to think this all condenses the feelings that she has been having all over her journey...and that hits home for me, I read a few of my first chapters in order to get the feeling for this right. If you ask me I did get it right, was biting my lip and breathing uneasily while I finished putting the last touches on this chapter. Enough of my whiny drama though.

**IC0: **Aerith has a nice ring to it. ALSO YES GODDAMIT WHY DO YOU HAVE TO REMIND ME I KILLED OWL, THE ESROWL WAS PROBABLY MY FAVORITE EVEN IF I DIDN'T DEVELOP IT THAT MUCH OR AT ALL! **Electronic Ink 0: **Thank you so much, I wasn't so sure about how I handled the fight in the last chapter, good to know you enjoyed it! **jtgamer-aza:** I'm happy that you hold my writing in such high regards and hope to see your review, even if it is on the last chapter of this story. Thank you so much for your reviews, it's been a pleasure having you. **OneTiredSloth:** I shall keep it up!

That's it for this week, if you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Broken Promises"

* * *

**November/7****th****/2024 – 4:00 A.M.**

**Twenty Seventh Floor of Aincrad – Ronbaru - Main Square**

The air in the early morning feels a little nostalgic. It makes me remember all those nights I would spend talking with Al about…anything really. We would sometimes carve into the early morning hours. He would open the window a little, letting the chilly breeze of the morning come into the room, perhaps to keeps us up for just a bit longer.

I feel bad for leaving the way I did. We had a lovely dinner, we all talked and joked, it was really a great time, if this had to be the last memory I have of them I wouldn't mind it one bit. It was all smiles...everyone was smiling. I stop knitting and look down, I just need to make another sleeve and I will be done with this stupid little sweater. I might just be able to finish it.

I look around the empty square around the teleporter. Ronbaru has got to be the place with least players in the whole game, it barely has shops and there's but a single inn in the whole settlement. I pull my menu down and look at the time. I had expected to run into someone by now, but I guess they are going to keep me waiting. Before dismissing my menu I can't help but to browse over to my guild tab, it is now empty and it wastes no time in telling me that I'm currently not in a guild. I dismiss the menu and start knitting again.

I perk my head up a little as I hear a set of footsteps approaching me. I raise my sight to find a dark figure right ahead of me, it wears a hood and a pitch black attire. I set my needles to the side on the bench I'm sitting at and stand up. The figure removes its hood to reveal a red head of hair and a face I sadly recognize.

"What are you trying to do?" he asks.

I remain silent and take a step forwards. I swallow my own spit and clear my throat.

"I was hopi-"

"Are your friends hiding somewhere around here?" he interrupts me, "According to some of my friends you are the only one that has left your guild house. What game are you trying to play?"

"I want to make a deal!" I state firmly.

Klaus stares at me, looking quite perplexed at my request. Second slater he starts laughing.

"Are you fucking kidding me right now?!" he laughs.

"I…I mean it!" I yell, "Do whatever you want to me…but leave my friends alone! Leave this stupid feud of yours for once and for all, I'll do everything you want!"

He approaches me, looking rather irked, his right eye twitching like that of a mad man.

"No, no, no…." he says, "You don't get to put an end to this."

He keeps walking and then stops about a two feet away from me.

"You have got to be the dumbest person I have ever met in this damn game," he says with a long, macabre grin, "However, I'll take you up on your offer, I shall do as I want with you."

In fear and panic I run to the right only to end up in the arms of another hooded figure. He holds me into place and chuckles. I see the man holding me smile, twisting the sickly looking scar on his right cheek as he does.

"You are a brave one little girl," he says with his husky, deep voice, "however…brave actions are often the ones that get people killed."


	78. Chapter 78 - Broken Promises

**Chapter 78 – Broken Promises**

**November/7****th****/2024 – 11:45 A.M.**

**Seventeenth Floor of Aincrad – Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds Guild House**

**Alshep**

The word "groggy" is probably the best word to define your whole being as you wake up in the morning. Your body isn't quite as ready as your mind is to receive the new day.

I blink a few times and let a big yawn out. I reach out behind me, hoping to make contact with Elina. It's odd to wake up with her not hugging me or at the very least resting her back against my own. My hand grasps the sheets behind me and I yawn once more.

"You up?" I ask to the air.

I close my eyes and slide my arm under my pillow. It's cool on the underside and it makes me breathe out slowly in comfort. Elina is yet to answer and with my eyes closed the only thing I can hear is Barrowdel growing busy with people.

"Eli?" I ask.

I muster enough energy to sit up and take a look to my right; the other side of the bed is empty. She probably went off to get something to eat. I go back to resting on my back and spread my arms and legs out, taking advantage that I have the bed all to myself for now.

It's surprising, but I'm more or less driven to the very edge of the bed every night. Elina moves a lot during her sleep and for better or worse I have gotten used to sleeping in minimal space. So whenever I'm able, I'm sure to take up as much of the bed as I'm physically able to. Closing my eyes I try to drift back into sleep to rest some more, but I hear a knock on the door.

I take a deep breath.

"Come on in," I say.

I sit up once again and get up from the bed, I hear something slam against the floor and look down at my feet to find nothing. I stretch slowly and look at the door as it swings open. Esra comes in, looking a bit worried.

"Master…" she mutters.

"What is it?" I ask as I pace around the bed, looking for whatever made the sound.

"Have you…have you seen Elina today?" she asks.

I finally make it over to Eli's side of the bed and on the floor I see a green-ish crystal. I bend over to pick it up. If I'm not mistaken this is some kind of record crystal. Elina often uses them to make herself voice memos.

"Nope," I answer softly and stand up straight, still holding the crystal in my hand.

"I feared as much…" she says, sounding worried, and drags her menu down.

I sit on the edge of the bed as I watch her fiddle around through her tabs. I rub my eyes and yet another damn yawn escapes my mouth. Suddenly I fully grasp the tone of Esra's last sentence.

"Wait, is something wrong?" I ask as I stand up, "Where is she?"

"I…I don't know," she says, "She is no longer in my friends list."

I change the crystal to my other hand and pull my menu down. I'm prompted with a notification as soon as I do so.

**-Elina has left your guild-**

What the hell kind of glitch is this? Or is she playing some sort of prank?

I stand up immediately, swallow my own spit and work my way over to friends tab to see that Elina's name is also missing from my list. I swipe up and down, hoping to find her name; perhaps it was randomly sorted in the wrong order or something. I find nothing. I take a quick look at Esra and in a brief unwanted moment of concentration I can hear my heart beating in my ears at a rapid, desperate rate.

"Master…try…try to calm down alright?" Esra mumbles as she walks closer to me.

She has her hands up in my direction as if getting ready for me to do something rash. As she reaches me she gently places her hands over my left arm, but I move away, brushing her off in a rude way.

"This is in very bad taste, Esra…" I huff, "I don't like this kind of joke, not right now."

"Master…I…"

"Where is she, Esra?" I ask, "She is hiding downstairs isn't she?"

"I don't know," she whimpers.

She looks scared of me; I'm not putting a calm and relaxed face right now after all, of that I'm very sure. My tone isn't the best either, but this is not the time to be playing stupid jokes. I hurry over to the door of my room and exit, pushing both of the doors with all my strength.

I make it out on the hallway and run over to the railing. I look down into the foyer and see Ruri and Kayla sitting on the couch, having some kind of food.

"Elina!" I scream.

Both girls turn to me with confused expression. I'm unable to generate other words that Elina's name.

"Elina?!" I yell.

I push myself off the railing and start heading downstairs. As I make my way past the first landing I see Aeri coming out of her room. Her eyes are a bit teary as she finishes yawning and stretching her arms up. I stop once I see her and take a second to catch my breath.

"Have you seen Eli?" I ask, "Do you know where she is?!"

"Good morning…" she says drowsily, "I haven't seen her…just woke up."

I turn on my heels and keep heading down. I skip several steps as I make my way down, almost tripping in my attempts to get to the ground floor faster.

"Elina?! Where are you?" I bellow one more time before stumbling into the middle of the living room area.

I drop the crystal in the process and see it slide close to the couch where both Kayla and Ruri are shooting me curious glances.

Why isn't anyone reacting to this? Did Elina just up and vanish? What the hell is going on?

"Master!" Esra rushes to my side.

"What's going on?" Kayla asks, "Maybe Eli just went to the market, you know?"

Ruri stands up from the couch and moves to pick up the crystal from the ground. She bends over and takes the crystal into her hands.

"You dropped this," she says as she hands it over to me.

I'm about to take the crystal away from Ruri's hand when the thing starts glowing in a brighter shade of green. Both of us stare at the crystal, failing to realize it has started to play its message.

"This is even harder than the first time I tried recording this…Where to start…" the crystal plays back.

There's no doubt it's her, that's Elina's voice, I will always recognize her voice in a heartbeat. My heart sinks as my mind begins to wander why she left this message, why I can no longer find her in my friends list or guild tab.

The voice playing back in the crystal chuckles for a second.

"I love you, Al. I hope you know that…through thick and think, always, please remember that," she says.

No, god please…no.

My throat twists into a nasty knot and I snatch the crystal out of Ruri's hand. I get on my knees as I continue listening to it. Kayla is now on her feet, just next to Ruri and Aeri stands close to Esra on my side.

"By the time you hear this, I will be gone," she says and stops.

"Gone where?" I ask the stupid crystal, my voice breaking, "Eli…where are yo-"

"Ah geez, that sounds horrible…it's not like it's going to be nice, but by the time you hear this I will have already quit the guild and…be nowhere in sight," Elina explains, as if answering the question I just asked, "I have chosen to put myself out there, in hopes that I can make everyone live a better life, a life without fear. Once I explain my plan I know you will find it stupid, you'll probably think it won't work and you are right…it might not, but I'm willing to give it a shot."

Her voice stops for a few seconds, it sounds as if she is dragging something. It sounds like a chair. I shake my head as I'm overanalyzing every single second of her message. I hear her breaths, whenever she recorded this; she was not having an easy time doing so. Her breathing is uneasy despite her words staying clear and her tone not wavering in the slightest.

The door to the house swings open with a loud slam.

"We are going to have brunch!" Sinna sings as she walks in with a brown bag, Aereth trailing behind her.

"Shut up!" I bark at the poor girl.

Her eyes widen as I scream at her and she purses her lips as if she were about to cry. Aereth places his hand over her head and brings her closer to him. He pats her head in order to calm her down and keep her from crying.

"Hey, watch it," Aereth huffs.

"Just keep it down…" Aeri backs me up.

"This is all I have left to put my hope on. As of late nothing has been going well, people getting hurt, our friends dying...thinking about it it's been going bad since quite a long time ago. I want to put a stop to it and this is the only thing I can possibly think of," Eli explains.

"That's Eli…" Sinna says, "Where's Eli?"

Aereth shushes the child in a far more gentle way than me screaming at her and we all continue listening to the message.

"I expect to be contacted by Klaus or that other man from the LC, maybe I can strike a deal with them, get them to leave you all alone in exchange of…me. I will do as they say as long as no other harm comes to you or anyone else. I'm willing to make this sacrifice."

My body freezes over and I can feel my hand shake, I'm almost struggling to keep a hold of the crystal in my own damn hand.

"Is she fucking serious?" Kayla bursts as she holds both of her hands to the sides of her head.

"I beg you, do not come looking for me, whatever happens. In the best of scenarios you will all be left alone…and that's what I'm hoping for. I hope that all of you, maybe even myself live to see the end of this game…just like you promised."

"No, I will look for you, I always will," I speak once again, not minding one bit that everyone is around me and the not giving a damn about the fact that I'm talking to a pre-recorded message, "No matter what I'm coming for you."

"Today I realized I was being…kind of mean at recording this, only for you," the message drones on, "It's cruel to leave everyone else without a goodbye, without a word, without explaining myself. So please show this to everyone as it will be my parting words for everyone, for my friends, for the people I love the most in my heart. I'm sorry."

I struggle to get up on my feet, but thanks to a little help from Esra I now stand in the middle of the room, holding the message crystal in front of me for everyone to hear. Each word that I hear from Elina in the message tears at me. I don't even know if she is alive and for all I know she could be in the hands of Klaus at this very moment.

"Esra," the message plays, as we all turn to see her, "I'll keep with me a ton of questions I always wanted to ask you, some regard your cooking and others are just purely about you and your personality. I'm sorry, but I just find you a bit quirky. I'll miss your food and chatting with you, teaching you how to knit…all of that."

During the whole playback of Elina's message to Esra I can see her hold both of her hands to her mouth as if trying to keep herself from crying. Sadly she doesn't manage to do so and by the end of it there are several tears rolling down her eyes.

"I never got to talk a lot with you Aereth, but you are a great man, even greater person, even if you don't like recognizing it. I thank you for helping me through hard times and thank you even more for keeping one of my best friends safe when she decided to part ways with us."

Aereth bites his lip, much like Esra he does this to try and hold something in. However, I believe he is an expert in doing so. So he keeps his composure and simply nods. It's almost a dead giveaway that the friend Elina talks about is Aeri, part of me would like to think she also refers to Reginald…but sadly he is no longer with us.

"Ruri and Kayla," Elina switches.

"No…I…" Kayla struggles, tears crowding her eyes, "I don't want to hear it…stop the crystal."

I pay little attention to her plea and let the crystal keep playing the message. Ruri embraces her, she tries her best to keep her calm, but for some reason it seems like Kayla is not ready to hear what Elina has to say to her.

"I really have to say that whenever I see you two together I can't help but to feel all warm and fuzzy inside. You two are just made for each other, and it shows. Kayla I've known for longer and trust me Ruri, I can see you make her happy, you make her be a better person you make her be honest with herse-"

"Stop the crystal, Al!" Kayla cries, speaking over the message "Stop it please!"

"…if I didn't find joy in the happiness of my friends," Elina laughs, "It's even better because it's two of my friends which find themselves in this happiness."

"It's not fair!" Kayla screams, "You don't get to do this to me! You don't get to just up and leave, after all these years! You don't get to do something this stupid!"

I can only begin to understand what Kayla is feeling. I have a mixture of emotions in my being as well. Rage, helplessness, sadness, but whatever Kayla is feeling surely feels a bit deeper. Her tears and broken cries only make me think that she feels betrayed. After all, Kayla and Elina met a long time ago, and I'll be damned if there's no history between them.

"Sinna, I'm sure it will be harder for you to understand, you are a sweet girl, and I'm happy I got to spend time with you playing and talking. Maybe we'll see each other in the future, maybe it'll be in real life, out of this game, I surely hope so…I really do. That goes for everyone."

"I'm happy I got to play with you too!" Sinna screams, her nose running, tracks of tears distinctly marking her face.

The poor girl is clenching her teeth as she cries, she is trying to stop herself from crying but her efforts only make her breathing sound like hiccups in between her cries.

"I want to see you too Eli!" she bawls, "but not like I will see sis...I want to see you for real!"

Not being able to keep it at bay anymore Sinna turns to Aereth and hugs him, hiding her face and muffling her cries in his stomach.

"Aeri…" Elina says.

I turn to Aeri and see her eyebrows burrow almost instantly. She appears mad, but knowing her it just means that she is sad.

"I know you are still sort of ashamed of looking me in the eye, but even with all that's happened I want you to know that I love you. You are a dear friend. I still remember the day I meet you in that inn," Elina laughs again, but it feels like the first genuine laugh in her whole message, "You looked rather nervous and torn about something, if only I knew that was because you left Al and Daath to face some powerful mobs. Look at how that turned out though, I like to think that your addition to our little group is what kickstarted the events that would eventually turn us into a guild. If it weren't because of you we would probably have stayed as a sad group of three people."

Aeri crosses her arms and looks away from me.

"Owl, Kayla, Kato, Esra, Ruri, Reginald, Siren, Hotoka, Twyla, Aereth, Sinna, Billfray," Elina says, with a bit of a stifle, "Thank you so much for letting me meet all those wonderful people. I will forever keep each and every single one of them in my heart."

Aeri closes her eyes and she bares her teeth as I see her clench them in a similar way like Sinna did. The message goes on to playback a moment from yesterday's night. I hear my own voice calling out for Elina, asking if she was alright and that dinner was ready.

She says that she is in fact alright…that she would be down for dinner in a second. What a bunch of crap. I should've known, I should've fucking known.

"Al…I started the first message with only you in mind, and I realize that was a mistake, as I can't leave you all only apologizing and telling all of these things to you. I'm too much of a coward to tell you and the others to the face, after all if I did, you would all stop me, I guess that's why I'm recording this…"

I should've stopped you, I should've realized.

"I'm sorry everyone, I really am."

Why didn't I realize?

"I can only hope my idea pans out as I'm hoping it will. I love you all…"

I love you.

"I'm sorry," the message ends.

The crystal stops shinning in its brighter shade and returns to normal. Leaving us in a quite house where the only thing left to hear are the soft sobs of a crying young girl. I drop the crystal and quickly equip myself with my sword and armor. I start heading for the door.

"Al, think this through," Aereth says as he moves himself to stand between me and the door.

"Out of the fucking way," I utter as I shove him.

I reach for the door and open it. I'm about to step outside when Aereth grabs a hold of my arm, pulling me back in.

"You have to stop and think!" he says, "You don't even know where she is."

Never in my entire time knowing Aereth did I hate his stupid face this much. I want to reach out and get him to unhand me, but he is right. Where would I even start looking? I press my hand against my forehead and growl like some caged animal.

"What am I to do?!" I ask, "You want me to stay here and think?! I need to find her!"

"Come on Kayla, please calm down…" Ruri says as she struggles to keep Kayla still.

I turn and see Kayla also wearing her armor and with her rapier hanging from her hip. Ruri is holding her with her arms stopping Kayla from approaching me and the door of the house.

"We need to go get her," Kayla cries.

"We don't even know where she is," Ruri says.

"I might be able to help with that," I hear behind me.

I turn around slowly, feeling my skin crawl as I vaguely recognize the voice that just spoke to my back. The second I see the first bit of red hair as I'm turning I reach out for the bastard's neck and wrap both of my hands around it. Even with my hands tightening around his neck, Klaus has the nerve to smirk at me.

I push him into the ground, making the crowd of NPCs in the street walk around us, completely disregarding the fact that I'm trying to choke him.

"Where is she?!" I ask.

"Now, now…" he struggles, "If you want me to talk you bette-"

I stop holding his neck and throw a punch at his face only to be stopped by the safety grid.

"How does it feel to finally lose?" he asks with a grin.

I throw another punch only to be met with the same outcome, my fist stopping mere inches away from his face.

"Where is she?" I ask as I get off of him.

Knowing well that it won't help in the matter I unsheathe my sword. Oddly enough just that is enough to finally get a reaction from the NPCs, they all scatter off to the sides and run away screaming, but other stay frozen in place, looking scared.

"Come on, Alshep," he says, "Are you seriously threatening me? Are you so fucking dense that you really think you have the upper hand?"

Everyone else joins me in the street, Kayla points her rapier at Klaus and I see Aeri take her place on my right side with her gauntlets already whirring to go.

"I'll send a message to Asuna," Esra says.

"If you do, I kill the girl," Klaus replies, "Trust me, I'll know, we have people everywhere."

Esra stops her hand immediately and reluctantly closes her menu. Klaus begins to laugh and approaches us despite our weapons being drawn. After all it's not like we can do anything to him at the moment.

"This is how it's going to go down," he says and points at both me and Aeri, "You two will meet me on floor one. You'll know the place Alshep, it's the very same place where I had the disgust of meeting your sorry ass. If any other of yours friends dares leave this shitty little place you call home, I'll have your precious little girlfriend killed. And trust me, I'll know if they try anything funny."

He points up with his right hand, and I can't help but to track his finger up to the roofs of other houses and buildings that are in front of our guildhouse. I'm able to see black hooded figures staring down at us.

"I'll say it again, I only want you and your crazy ass friend down on the first floor," he states.

"And what then?" I ask.

"Oh, we are going to have some fun," he replies, "I'll see you there, heh, don't be late."

He turns around and leisurely walks down the street. I want to lunge at him, attack him, kill him, but I can't. I feel my body trembling, yet there is nothing I can do about it. Never in my entire life had I felt so useless.

"I'm going with you two!" Kayla says.

"No," Aeri answers, "You are all going to stay here, I'll go with Al."

"But…Aeri!" Sinna retorts.

"I'm sorry, Sinna," she says softly, "We have to go get Eli back, me and Al, we'll be back soon."

"Don't lie to me!" Sinna cries.

Aeri and Aereth both nod at each other and Aereth starts practically dragging Sinna back into the house.

"You are not coming back!" Sinna cries, "Don't go!"

"You gotta let me go with you…please…I…" Kayla huffs, she breathes in deeply and then lets her arms drop, "Just…just come back alive."

"Yeah, you better," Ruri seconds, then her and Kayla walk back into the house.

Esra has her eyes trained on the hooded players standing atop the buildings across from the street. Her legs are shaking slightly, but in her eyes I see determination, not fear.

"I can catch them off guard, if it's only three of them maybe I can eve-"

"Esra, please, this is not your fight," I say, "It never was…we just dragged you into it."

"We'll, put an end to it," Aeri says and looks at me, "One way or another."

* * *

**First Floor of Aincrad – Starting City – Monument of Life**

I had to do this, I just had to check.

I find myself staring at Elina's name in the massive stone tablet. It's not crossed out nor clicking it displays information of her would be death. I breathe easy for the first time since I left floor seventeen.

"She is fine, right?" Aeri asks from the middle of the room, "We took some time getting ready…I thought maybe Kla-"

"She is alive," I answer.

"What are we going to do?" she asks.

"I don't know."

I have no idea what we are going to walk into. We could be walking into several members of Laughing Coffin, all of them ready to gut us. We could be walking only on the bastard himself, ready to kill Elina just for his amusement.

"We'll find a way, I'm sure," Aeri says, sadly her tone doesn't back up her confident words.

"How's that girl acting up?" I ask.

Her gaze suddenly diverts away from me and an uncomfortable expression crawls over her face.

"She is here alright…" she mutters, "She is really acting up."

Of course she is. I've always had my theories about this madness of her, ever since she told me about it I've spent more time than I'm comfortable admitting trying to figure it out. The whole thing is linked to the Klaus and Laughing Coffin by extension. I'm not sure if they are the source, but they are the main thing that stirs Aeri up.

I walk over to her, she is trying to appear calm, but she is more than ready to go. I'm sure anyone in this type of situation would try to keep a straight face, but there´s this hint of a smile over Aeri's face, along with a rather intimidating thousand yard stare. I don't blame her, in a way this is what she has been craving for the better part of two years. A chance to finally kill Klaus, however, we might be heading into a scenario where we don't even get that chance.

"You ready?" I ask.

She nods ands and turns around to leave the room. I follow closely, gripping my sword, ready to unsheathe at the first sign of something fishy. There's still no real danger while inside the city, but if I've learned anything is that it never hurts to be extra careful. It's a bit funny…in a way. I'm trying to be careful, yet I'm about to walk head first into what very possibly is a death trap. I had a good run, two years I survived.

"When do you think they'll beat this game?" I ask as we make our way past the teleport plaza of the city.

"I don't think they will…" she says softly, "It's been too long…far too long."

I've seen the toll this damn game had on Aeri before, but I've always seen her as the type of person that would hold on until the very end. The last few months have been everything but ideal and I can understand Aeri's word at this very moment. I feel defeated, not by Klaus and his merry band of psychos, but by this game. I try to enjoy my stay in this prison every time I can, but in the end that's what it is.

A prison.

"You know…" she mutters, "If this is where our story ends…"

"Aeri…" I huff.

She turns to me with a smile, yet I can see pain and sadness behind it.

"I wouldn't mind one bit," she says, "We had a great run…haha."

"Let's not let it get to that, alright?"

She nods and we finally make it out of the city and unto the dirt road that leads to Tolbana. She equips her gauntlets. The road has some mobs and the occasional wolf. They are a joke at our current skill level, but it's not like we want to lose some health points to some stupid wolf that got in the way.

The walk over to Tolbana is silent, just like it was on that first day. The first floor is home to some pretty strong wind, strong enough to move the blades of grass of the fields and force them to sound off with an overlapping whoosh.

I see a bear charging at me from the right and unsheathe my sword. I keep walking, ignoring the fact that I'm getting closer and closer to the boar. I simply lift my blade and point it at the animal. Boars are stupid and once they are charging they are not stopping. This allows for the dumb animal to run head first into my sword and die mere seconds after coming into contact with it.

Over on the left, on Aeri's side, there's a wolf that trails her up the road. It's not doing anything yet, but if I remember their patterns correctly it should lunge at her anytime now. We talk a dozen steps further up the road and just as I expected the wolf jumps at Aeri to attack her. She simply raises her left hand, catching the wolf by its neck before it even has time to react. She lowers her hand and drags the wolf along as we keep walking. The thing whimpers and whines and after a few seconds just disappears in Aeri's hand.

"This road used to be dangerous," she says.

"It used to," I chuckle.

We are left alone for the rest of the way to Tolbana. The town is empty, not that this is a surprise. Anyone that decided to stay back on this floor you can find around Starting City and even that place is a freaking ghost town. I get a bit ahead of Aeri, keeping my eyes peeled; I need to find Eli as soon as possible. We are getting close to the inn we always used to stay at when Klaus comes out one of the smaller side streets. He's alone and he is walking without a care in the world.

"Took you long enough," he says, "If I got bored I was going to start having some fun with your girlfriend. You know she look like she has this…fragile body."

In an instant my blood is boiling and I steady my blade in his direction.

"Cut the shit," Aeri says in a deep tone, her voice sounding as if her words scrapped her throat.

Klaus smirks.

"Follow me just outside of town then," he says and gives us his back.

"It would be so easy," Aeri huffs, dragging her words, "Just kill him right now."

I place my free hand over her shoulder.

"Keep it together," I say.

"I'll try," she replies.

We follow the former leader of The White Snakes outside of Tolbana. As soon as the small buildings and houses are out of the way we are greeted with about fifteen…maybe seventeen players, all clad in black clothes and with stupid black hoods.

Klaus slowly joins the mass of players and turns around to give us another smug look. Amongst the crowd of people I'm quickly able to locate PoH. He is the only one other than Klaus that is currently not hiding his face with a hood. He stares over in my direction, with a blank expression. Aeri and I keep approaching the group of players but decide to stop, leaving a good space between us.

"Where is she?" I ask.

"You sound like a broken record Alshep," Klaus laughs, "but don't worry…"

He moves to the side and pulls Elina out from behind his friends. He pulls her from her hair and places her in front of him.

"She is right here," he says.

I yank my body forwards but immediately stop. Not right now, now it's not the time to do anything stupid. I try my best to breathe in slowly and let the air out through my nose. Relax, come on.

"So what's the deal?" I ask.

"Oh…" Klaus says, sounding surprised, "There is none, you are here to die."

I raise my sword once more and get ready, Aeri raises her arms and lowers her stance.

"Kill them!" Klaus yells.

Only four players from the group of LC members lunge towards us. They stop halfway realizing not all their comrades are following them. Klaus looks almost as confused as his four friends who stopped halfway.

"What are you doing?" Klaus asks, "Don't just stand there, get those two idiots."

"I believe that is not how it's going to work," PoH says calmly and raises his left hand.

PoH's hand gesture prompts the rest of the players to move over and stand behind him. I exchange a quick confused look with Aeri. She shrugs and I do as well and we quickly return our line of sight to Klaus and his four friends who are the only ones who stand in front of us now.

"I've had enough with this quarrel of yours, you are like a brain dead chicken who goes around flapping its wings just because it can," PoH says sounding annoyed, "These two killed members of my group as well, but I took too long to realize that if I had only kicked you out they would've stopped coming after me."

"Wait…but, I thought you wanted to kill them!" Klaus yells.

"I do," PoH says slowly, and turns his head towards us, he smiles, "but not nearly as much as they want to kill you."

PoH raises his hand once more and the players behind him all pull out blue crystals. They all shout different town names across Aincrad and disappear into thin air as they teleport. Klaus is starting to look rather nervous as the only couple of people that did heed his command are as confused as he is.

"It's time for Laughing Coffin to move on to other things," PoH says, "You five are what remains of your pathetic little guild…The White Snakes…what a mistake. You had potential Klaus, too bad you created relentless enemies."

"You can't fucking leave, not right now!" Klaus complains.

"I can, and I will," PoH says calmly and raises a crystal above his head, "Teleport, Ralberg."

PoH disappears, leaving us with only Klaus and his other four friends to deal with. Only five of them, we can manage if we are careful. Klaus is at a disadvantage and no longer has the support he was expecting when he brought us here. Maybe, just maybe we can make it out of this, Elina, Aeri and I.

"Let's go," Aeri mumbles, "Bloodlust!"

I dash along with her, she runs towards the two players on the left and I take the ones on the right. However, she is a bit smarter than that. As I approach the players on the right, she changes her direction and joins me. With a skill I slash at the first player who just barely manages to raise his sword. I cut his side and Aeri jumps in to grab his arm, she then clamps her other hand around his head and with what looks like an easy tug she rips his arm off. I swing at him and with a skill draw a cross over his body, the last blows kills him.

"Stop!" Klaus screams with desperation, "I'll kill her! I swear I'll kill her!"

"No you won't" Elina growls and twisting her body she bites Klaus' arm.

"Eli!" I call out, losing focus of the fight.

"Watch out!" Aeri exclaims as the second players we were aiming for slips by her.

I watch the man close the distance to me with a few steps and swing at me with his axe. I feel the blade of the axe dig into my side and with a grunt of discomfort jump away from it. I take a look past the player and see Aeri getting ready for the other two players. A little bit past her I see Klaus swinging his sword at Elina.

Eli struggles to go around her menu and dodging the attacks, I bet she is trying to get a hold of a weapon or something. I see a brief light shining over her arm and waist. As the light fades I see small buckler and a short sword appear on her body. She stops and raises her arm to block one of Klaus' strikes.

"You are still not paying attention, huh?!" the man who attacked me yells.

Again, due to my lack of focus I let him in close for an easy attack on me. He slashes at me with his axe, damaging my chest plate and dropping some of my health points. He readies another swing with a skill this time, his axe glows and I raise my sword to counter it.

My blade clashes against his, but I trip slightly as I try to back-step allowing his weapon to slip past mine and hit me over the shoulder. The blade digs in deep this time, but I take advantage of the situation and stab the man right in the stomach with my sword. This prompts him to back off and take his weapon with him. My health points are nearing fifty percent. His damn weapon hits hard.

I steady myself with a few steps back and lower my sword to ready a skill. The man blindly attacks me and I swipe up with my sword right in the middle of his body. I leave a line of damage all the way between his legs up to his face. The attack staggers him and I drive my sword through his stomach one more time. I push the blade in all the way up to the hilt and leave it there. I let go of my blade and grab his left arm with both of my hands. I twist his arm around and use my weight to pull him over me, slamming him against the ground thanks to my unarmed skill. He lands on his back allowing me to retrieve my sword with ease and stab him a couple of times. By the third time I drive my sword through him he dies.

I turn to see that Elina hasn't even been able to unsheathe her blade, she's been dodging attacks left and right, blocking a few of them. What I can also see on her body is that she has also received a few, there are several lines of damage across her body and she seems to be running out of stamina. I have to hurry.

"Stop moving you little shit!" Klaus screams.

"Aeri, how are you hold-" I stop.

Turning to Aeri I see her ripping the head of one of her attackers as she laughs with some macabre glee. To her demise the other player left swipes at her feet with his bastard sword, cutting both of her legs clean off.

Aeri's laughter stops as she hits the ground and I start moving. I ready up my "Downfall" skill as I see the last man that remains has some bulk under his stupid garbs. Probably the only smart man to double up on armor and still keep up with the group's stupid uniform.

The man raises his sword and strikes Aeri while she is on the floor, unable to move. I speed up and jump towards the man as he raises his sword once again.

"Downfall!" I scream as come down on top of him.

The man reacts by turning around, accidentally pointing his sword in my direction. Unable to change my direction I fall right on his blade. I feel the thing pierce me, inch by inch through my chest. This doesn't stop me from swinging at him.

My sword impacts his chest and I hear something breaking, he did have some armor under his clothes. The impact of my skill tumbles the man to the ground and I fall on top of him, his blade still inching its way through my body. I drop my sword and spread out my palm. I pull my arm back and drive my fingers into the man's chest.

It almost feels as if my fingers were a blade; they feel like steel as I stab him through the chest with only my bare hands. I repeat the motion switching my hands. Left, Right, Left, Right. I stop counting, but after a few more hits I manage to get rid of him. My body drops a few inches into the ground and I manage to stay on my knees. I take a look at the sky as it turns red with a pattern grid. It displays a message.

**-Forced Administration Mode-**

I shake my head. Focus, focus, I'm not dying, not right now, not yet.

I reach for the sword poking out of my body and start pulling it. My health drops faster as I try to remove it. I struggle a few seconds, but I manage to remove the sword just as my health drops down to critical levels.

I push my hand into my pockets and pull out a healing crystal, but I drop it as soon as I hear Elina cry out in pain. I raise my head to take a look at her and Klaus.

"So it all came down to this, huh?!" he yells from the very bottom of his being.

My heads up display is giving my instincts a real run for their money at telling me how close I am to dying, but there are things that take precedence at this moment. On my knees I throw my body forwards and reach for my sword. I take hold of it and bring it close to my side. I clutch at my chest, at my new shiny wound that gives off a disturbing red glow.

"Now that your friends can't help, what will you do?!" he asks, "You are all alone now!"

Klaus holds Elina's paralyzed body by her hair as he presses his sword against her neck. Aeri groans uncomfortably next to me. Just glancing at her I can see her face and body, riddled with glowing scars as she winces in pain. I need to move, move dammit! I stumble up on my feet and even though I'm close to dying I'm filled with strength more than ever before. Move!

"Al it's ok…" Elina says softly and smiles.

"No, it's not," I huff and raise my sword in front of me.

"Listen to your girlfriend dumbass, it's over!" Klaus says.

"Al…please, it's going be alright," she insists.

As I'm about to start running her way she hits Klaus with the back of her head and unsheathes her sword from her side. Her short sword shines brightly, but so does Klaus' blade as he raises it above his head. My body tenses and my mouth suddenly goes dry, but I hear my voice screaming.

"Elina!"

I see Eli's sword make contact first, but Klaus' follows closely behind. The weight of his sword pushes through Elina's shoulder, until it stops halfway through her upper body. Her body starts giving off a faint glow.

"No! no!" I scream, being just a few feet away.

Her body shatters into pieces right in front of me. I try to reach out for the shards as if it would fix anything. I raise my sword and without even thinking I start slashing Klaus' body. Suddenly the ground bellow me feels uneven.

"I'll fucking kill you!" I scream as I keep attacking his body.

I never attacked with this much speed in my whole time here. One slash after the other, I chain and activate every single skill I have to attack him. I can see his health draining in front of me; it's racing down to the critical level.

I raise my sword over my head and grab it with both of my hands.

"Die!" I scream as I make one last attack.

His body gives off the same faint glow as Elina's did and shatters right in front of me. Right after the crystals dissipate a massive chunk of stone falls right in front of me. The stone takes a bit of the ground in front of me with it leaving but a whole into nothingness.

I look back at Aeri who is struggling to drag herself closer to me. Her skill is no longer active, but as I finally gain some clarity I realize the ground around us is falling apart. Chunks from floors above us are falling down, destroying the first floor in the process.

"Al!" she exclaims as she extends her arm to me, "What's happening?"

I don't answer but instead I try to move towards her. I reach out as well, just to see if I can grab her off the ground. As I'm reaching her she is enveloped in light and slowly disappears out of sight. I about to reach her hand when it completely disappears.

I stop right where her body was just a few seconds and look up just in time to see a rock twice my size plummeting right at me. I raise my arms in a stupid attempt to shield myself and everything goes dark.

* * *

It's all dark, so dark. Is this what death is like? Darkness?

I chuckle and feel a sharp stinging pain in my throat. A different kind of pain it almost feels real. At least there's pain in death, it had been a while since it felt like this. It's oddly reminiscent of when you have a throat infection.

I try opening my eyes, but they feel as if my eyelids were glued together. It hurts; it's like a burning sensation. I make another few attempts and I suddenly see a bright white light.

What is that?

I try blinking again and see the light again, it's blinding, it hurts as it hits my eyes.

"…okay?"

A faint voice. What is this?

"Are…..ok?"

There it is again. I struggle but my eyes slowly start focusing on what looks like bright lights affixed to the ceiling.

"Are you ok?" the voice says.

I turn my head slight, every muscle in my neck hurting as I do. I see a woman in a nurse outfit. She has brown-ish hair and brown eyes. Her hair is in a braid the goes down over her shoulder.

"Are you ok?!" she screams looking a bit panicked.

She shines a light in my eyes, making me raise my hand to push the light away. Another wave of pain courses my entire body as I make the effort to move.

"Where am I?" I ask, my voice sounding completely alien to me.

"You are alive!" she yells, "Doctor! A second one has woken up! Over here on bed number eight!"

Alive? I didn't die?

"I'm…I," I huff and try to sit up, I feel a heavy burden over my shoulders on top of incredible pain going over my back, neck and head, "I'm…I…where am I?"

"Try to take it easy," says a tall man with a white coat as he approaches me, "You haven't been using your body, lie back down please."

He tries to push my back down but I fight him as I try to stay sitting up. I finally am able to focus all around me. I seem to be in some kind of ward. There are several beds around me. All of them have people with metal helmets over their heads. The Nervegear.

I reach for my head and feel the metallic helmet over me. I yank it off of my head and hear it fall to my side making a loud thud once it hits the floor.

"Please, you have to calm down," the man insists, "I'm a doctor, I'm here to help. Lie back down."

"In what..." I cough, "What hospital is this?! Answer me….where am I?!"

"You are in Sannō Hospital, son," he says with a bright smile, "Welcome back to the real world."

* * *

Crysina here!

I know I'm late, and I apologize if there are some stupid dumb mistakes in this chapter. I had to edit things in the site's editor and it sometimes saved the things I did and sometime sit didn't So that's why I took like an extra few hours checking this was in it's best possible version. So I'm sorry about that. WOW We are out of SAO, now I'm happy to be introducing you to the epilogue of my story which I'm still thinking if it should be 4 or 5 more chapters. IT FEELS SO AWESOME TO FINALLY BE DONE WITH THE VIRTUAL WORLD FOR SOME REASON. I know maybe some of you will find part of this chapter eerily similar to how actual SAO ends it's first arc, and in all honesty it's kind of a tribute to it. Also do consider this is not the end of the story so I guess that makes it feel different? EITHER WAY!

**Contemplation: **Well I did address the thing you mention in my story. I find your review a tad bit weird, but trust me I understand what you are saying you do have to lose some logic to enjoy some stuff haha. Thanks for your review and let's hope they don't ruin the Alicization arc as it's the only one I actually consider interesting outside of the Aincrad one. Thet thoroughly fucked Fairy Dance and GGO if you ask me. **IC0: **Hopefully this chapter answers your question. But hey hang in there alright we still have a tiny bit to go, I will be sure to give you all nice closure. **SkySlash9: **LONG TIME NO SEE. I'm glad to see you review again, and I'm sorry for what happened in this chapter I guess, remember though there's still a bit more to come. THIS IS NOT THE END. **davidholguin2: **It sucks that your reviews haven't been getting posted like you told me through PM :( I'm glad you look forward to my story, so please keep looking forward to it until the end! There's more feels to mess around with! **Electronic Ink 0: ***gives you a box of tissues* Come on it's alright, well not for our characters but, hey it's alright. *Gives you another box of tissues for this chapter* **jtgamer-aza: **How are those feelings now? Don't hate me please.

OMG well that's that for this week. AS ALWAYS, if you like what you read, want to send me death threats or something similar, please leave a review! I will se eyou all next week!

Next Chapter: "F1esh &amp; B0nes"


	79. Chapter 79 - F1esh & B0nes

**Chapter 79 – F1esh &amp; B0nes**

**November/7****th****/2024 – 03:45 P.M.**

**Sannō Hospital - Tokyo**

**Yuuji**

"Please try to raise your right arm," the nurse says.

Everything is numbing. "Sensory overload", the doctor called it. Every noise in this room is making my ears ring. The beeps of multiple vital monitors going off, the voices of both nurses and doctors rushing from one side of the room to the other…the cries of other patients around me, it's all too loud.

I was the second person to wake up in this ward. It confused the personnel a lot to see only two individuals wake up at first. It took the others around ten more minutes to wake up. Sadly there are still a couple of people that are yet to wake up. They have already been moved to another place, but it terrifies me to think that even with everyone else waking up there are still a couple of poor souls that did not have the same luck as me.

I breathe in through my nose and look around the room a little more; I can only see a couple of patients right in front of me. The one right in front of me is a girl with absurdly long brown hair. I guess it's to be expected in a way, after all a bit of my eye sight is blocked by my own hair. Never did I ever let my hair grow past my forehead. On the left side of this girl I can see a man with an overgrown beard. On the other side is small boy, probably younger than myself for a few years.

It still hurts to move my neck a lot, not to mention that I woke up and sat up almost immediately, that also hurts like a bitch, it still hurts like a bitch.

"I…I…" the nurse stutters, "I really need you to try and move your arm."

She snaps me out of my thoughts, but it's not like I didn't hear her request at first. I just chose to ignore it. A doctor has already checked up on me and says that I'm fine. That the only thing I should worry about right now is not moving much. That was just before everyone else started waking up and the room grew into a mess of noises.

"Please…could you please raise your arm?" she insists.

"I heard you the first time," I answer quietly.

Her eyes linger on me, she clearly doesn't like my answer. I have nothing against her, I´m just fed up. I have been staring at the one clock in this room; it's right in front of me, right over the bed of the girl opposite of me. I woke up about thirty minutes ago or something, but it already feels like several hours have come and gone.

I know the medical personnel here are just trying to do their job, but I'm already tired of listening to them. Even if they are not talking to me or instructing me to do something, I have been hearing the same damn set of words over and over again.

Move your legs.

Move your head.

Move your arms.

Take a deep breath.

Exhale.

The nurse nervously looks around and then sighs, looking both defeated and a bit sad. She moves up my bed, getting closer to me and leans in close to my ear.

"It's…it's my first week working here, please, just help me out alright?" she says, her voice quivering slightly.

She backs away and looks at me with steady eyes. I find it a little hard to believe that she is actually a newbie in the...nurse business. She does look jumpy and a little in over her head, but why would they put a woman on her first week to take care of us. I'm no genius and it doesn't take one to realize this is a case that should be handled with extreme care.

I clear my throat, trying not to recoil too much at the odd pain and slowly raise my right arm. The nurse's face brightens up in the matter of seconds and without missing a heartbeat she slips the weird sleeve thing over my arm to measure my blood pressure.

"Wha…" I start, but cough loudly.

"Come again?" she asks casually.

"What's the name…like the real name of that pressure thing?" I ask, trying to make awkward small talk.

I feel the sleeve tightening around my arm, it's just a tad bit of pain. I find myself in a really weird kind of masochistic relish. The pain…it's amazing, in an odd, twisted way. It's just great to feel it again. A minute or so after waking up, the nurse brought me a cup of water. I drank it immediately, despite them telling me to start with small sips I just chugged the whole thing. The way the water went down my throat was just incredible. It made me feel like I wanted to puke almost right away, but I'll be damned if it wasn't amazing.

"It's a baumanometer," she says.

"I thought these were kind of obsolete," I say, my voice once again not reaching the volume I want it to.

"Sorry?" she asks.

I clear my throat. I'm annoyed. My stupid body is not responding as I would like it to, it's infuriating. I still cannot understand how I'm able to move. In movies, they always have the people go through months of rehab before even being able to close their hands properly.

"I thought the bauma…uh that procedure to measure blood pressure was obsolete," I grunt.

"No medical procedure is ever obsolete," she says with glee.

There's this pleasant aura to the nurse now that I see her smiling as I let her do her job. However I can't help myself but to tease her.

"What about leeches?" I ask with a grin.

"Ah…well," she mumbles, "It's not fair to go back to such archaic times…"

"I guess it isn't," I chuckle, "Mercury thermometer."

"Oh come on…" she whines, "Either way, you are doing just fine!"

The sleeve deflates around my arm and the release of pressure prompts a nice tingling sensation over my arm. She removes it and I reach for it with my left hand and rub the area where the sleeve was just seconds ago. I trace my finger along my skin and then close my hand around it. I smile. Looking up I realize the nurse is staring at me with intense curiosity. I let go of my arm and chuckle awkwardly.

"It…it must feel amazing, huh?" she asks, "Finally…feeling again."

"It's odd," I say softly, "It feels so different…I had gotten used to things feeling so much more differently. Sounds weird, huh?"

I look over to my right, on top of a small counter lies my NerveGear, one of its side is a bit dented given once I got it off from my head I let it fall to the floor. I look at it and feel my face twist into a sour expression.

That piece of technology right there is more or less responsible for everything that I suffered, all the death, the killing...

"What was it like?" she asks, and seconds later covers her mouth, "I didn't mean…uh, you don't have to answer. I'm so sorry!"

"It's alright," I mutter.

I lean back on the slightly reclined bed and look up at the bright lights on the ceiling. The noise around me grows a bit louder as one of the patients starts crying. It sounds like a girl. She cries for her mother and father, she is practically begging to see them. I haven't seen anyone that doesn't look like a doctor or nurse come inside this ward yet. I can't help but feeling that we won't be receiving visitors any time soon.

I close my eyes, and do so tightly. Even with the new commotion, even while thinking that all of this is a dream…I can't stop thinking about her. She is gone...and it's my fault. Crystals of light fog my mind, like on a loop, I hear the crash as if glass were breaking.

"So…what was it like?"

I open my eyes and raise my eyebrow as I take a look at the nurse.

"Uh…I…thought I could ask since you…uh oh geez….I'm sorry," she apologizes.

"It was like a prison," I answer, "Nothing ever felt right. Eating, drinking, moving…breathing…living in there just felt wrong."

The nurse just stares, but she still looks like she is expecting something. It's not like I have much else to say, or I think there's not much else I want to share with her. After all she is just a stranger. She is just a woman who I have known in the span of forty minutes or so. Yet…my words are enough to move her to tears.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you cry…" I apologize, despite there being nothing for me to apologize for.

"Miki, we need you in the other ward!" Another nurse says.

Another woman all dressed in white gets close to the nurse that was checking up on me and pulls her from her arm. Still in tears she is dragged by her peer out of the ward.

"Miki…" I mumble to myself.

The sudden realization of only knowing two of my friend's real names strikes. It hits me hard as I can feel tears getting bigger in the corners of my eyes. I'm such an idiot. Elina's name was Kosaka Akari…and Aeri's Kanada Mirai.

I slam my fist on the rail surrounding my bed and clench my teeth, almost biting my tongue in the process.

"God dammit…" I whimper, trying to keep my voice steady.

It hurts so much to be making the effort to hold it all in. I can't. Not any longer, I'm going to break. I open my mouth to let out loud, drawn out and pathetic sobs. My vision gets blurry with tears as I pull my head back and continue crying like a small child.

I cover my eyes with my hands and rub the tears away, but my own breathing is so erratic to the point that I find myself gasping in between cries. I clench my teeth yet again and turn my cries in groans and grunts.

They are all gone, my friends, they are all gone. I never even bothered to learn their names and the ones I did…both of them are dead. Both of them disappeared before my eyes.

Why am I alive? Why the hell am I alive?

"Hey, you need to get back to bed!" A man screams.

"I need…I need to use a phone," I voice weakly replies.

I open my eyes in a flash as I notice a familiar tone in that voice. I look around spastically, provoking myself more pain in the process and see a girl limping her way across the room. I wipe any sign of tears from my eyes and try to focus on her. She has long black hair that falls down her back quite a bit below her shoulders. Her eyes are blue and as she gets closer I realize who she is. I just couldn't recognize her sooner, she isn't wearing her uniform.

"Esra," I say, my voice again being lower than I intend it to.

She walks past my bed, she rest her weight on the tube holding her serum as she walks. Her limping is almost painful to watch, I want to get up and help her.

"Please, we need you to go back to your bed," a man yells across the room.

"Phone, I need to use one," she groans.

I turn my head to the man and see him tending to another patient. Everyone else seems to be busy as well as no one is yet to go after her. I trace the tubing connected to my hand and see that my serum is on my right. With all the strength I can muster I push the railing on the right side of the bed down and let my feet fall unto the ground. The cold sensation of the floor slithers up my spine and I reach out for the tripod holding my serum.

"Esra," I call out again.

Too weakly…again.

I wrap both my hands around the tube and pull myself up. Every single muscle in my legs hurts and stiffens as I stand up. I grunt loudly and start resting part of my weight over the tube. Esra's walking almost looks like an easy stroll compared to how it actually feels. I move the tube ahead of me and catch up to it with a lot of effort. She makes it look so damn easy.

I'm almost out of breath by the time I make it around my bed. I breathe in through my nose and exhale through my mouth. There's sheer struggle in even moving my foot in front of the other. I need to reach her though, even if I collapse from exhaustion.

As I get behind her I'm able to see her bare back thanks to the patient gown she is wearing, she looks so frail and thin. Not that I'm any different, two years without eating any actual food will do that to you I guess.

"Esra!" I scream.

She doesn't react to my voice, she just keeps droning on towards the doors of the ward. I hear the doctors behind me, telling me to stop. It surprises that none of them has bothered to go after us. Esra pushes the doors open with her body more than anything and stumbles into her knees.

"You need to go back to bed," I hear behind me.

I turn around and see a nurse approaching me. Having no other way to reach out for Esra I throw my body forwards. I crash against the doors leaving my serum behind. I feel a sharp pain on the back of my hand and meet the floor with both of my hands which only sends a wave of pain over all of my body.

I'm finally out in the hallway where I can see Esra being restrained by a couple of nurses. Writhing on the floor I drag myself a mere few inches forward, still trying to reach her. I push my right hand ahead of me and see the back off my hand completely covered in blood. I sure fucked up wherever the needle was over my own hand. I stare it at in disbelief and then chuckle a little as I pull myself a little more, smearing my own blood over the hospitals floor.

"Esra!" I scream, my voice hurting my own throat, but finally being loud enough.

She turns around immediately with wide eyes and starts looking around. Her sight drops to me and her eyes tear up immediately. She drops to her knees, and reaches out for me, pushing the nurses away from her in the process.

I feel her take hold of my bloody hand and taking incredible strength out of her being she pulls me close to her.

"Please t-tell me I'm not going crazy," she cries softly.

Letting go of my bloody hand she cradles my face with her hands, forcing me to look at her. Her eyes look bloodshot on top of constant tears going down yet her face she makes for a both sore and beautiful sight.

"Is it you?" she asks, "Is it really you?"

I chuckle and place my right hand over hers.

"Who else you know to constantly be doing stupid things like this?"

"Master!" she gasps.

I'm filled with an overwhelming joy as I hear that particular word. Despite me telling her to drop the name over the years and feeling a bit embarrassed every time she called me so, hearing it right now just brings a big dumb smile to my face. Sadly, our reunion is cut a little bit short as doctors and nurses swarm us to get us back to our respective beds.

They take us back to our beds, but we both calm down on the account that now we know we are in the same room. Esra is just three beds to my right. Knowing that someone else made it out and that she is a few meters next to me just calms me.

We are kept in the same ward for a couple of days. The doctors explain that they will be moving us to smaller rooms in order to better take care of us and to hopefully begin a process of rehabilitation. They also explain that we are rather unique case for rehabilitation. Unlike in a real coma we weren't exactly unconscious, all thanks to the NerveGear. Our real bodies were not moving or experiencing any type of activity, however our brains were in constant use. We were moving about, talking, eating, breathing, running, etc…all of that in a virtual space. So our brain hasn't forgotten how to do any of those things. Our bodies are just weak and frail right now, our muscles suffer from a bit of atrophy but other than that we shouldn't suffer any actual cognitive damage as in a case of someone with a regular coma.

It was rather surprising to hear this from a doctor, more over for him to have quite a bit of knowledge of how the NerveGear works. After all I guess it would be dumb to assign someone who has no idea of what he is treating to a case as particular as ours.

After a lot of talking and arguing with the personnel we managed to convince them to move us into the same shared room. The main reason they weren't really allowing us to do so was because we didn't have the same sex, however a lot of bitching and moaning about whole deal, and explaining we knew each other well from the virtual world finally got them to agree.

* * *

**November/23****rd****/2024**

"We'll see you tomorrow sweetie," Esra's mother says as she exits the room, "Great work today!"

"We'll come by as soon as we wake up, but for now it's back to work," her father says.

"Good luck at the restaurant," Esra waves goodbye with a smile.

"You take care now," her father says before briefly glancing over to me, "I'm so sorry, you take care as well Yuuji."

"Oh goodness," the mother gasps, "We'll see you tomorrow as well dear."

A bit embarrassed a wave them goodbye as well and chuckle a bit.

"I'll try not to go anywhere," I joke.

Both of them are laughing as they exit the room and once they close the door I can hear a faint laughter coming from Esra. She holding her stomach with one hand and covering her mouth with the other. She is laughing wholeheartedly, however her face is in a bit of pain, after all she did just come back from her rehab exercises.

"Come on, Esra…" I sigh, "It wasn't that good of a joke."

Her laughter stops immediately and she pouts in my direction with angry eyes.

"You are still calling me that!" she complains.

"Force of habit…" I excuse myself.

I scratch the back of my head and laugh. Can she really blame though? I just learned her name a few weeks ago. It's hard for me not to call her what I had been calling her for over a year all of the sudden.

Trying to see if I dodged a bullet a look around the room and shift a little over my bed. I push the button on the side of the bed to make me sit in a more upright position and stare out through the window to the setting sun.

"I'm waiting, Yuuji," she insists.

"Oh come on, calling you that is way better than you calling me Master when your father was in the room," I laugh.

"That I will admit was my mistake…" she blushes.

The man shot me a glance that damn near made me shit myself.

"Mio…was it?" I tease.

"Don't be like that!" she whines, "And what's my family name?! I bet you forgot about that!"

It had an "E" in it, sadly I did forget, my mind hasn't been in a good place of late. My father is yet to visit me, not like I blame him. I got my hands on my cellphone thanks to Miki a few days ago. She was kind enough to bring me the clothes and items I was admitted with a few days ago. I had my phone charged and talked to my father. He got fired after skipping a few days to stay in the hospital with me apparently. So he's been working all the way up in in Sapporo. He also said he would come visit me as soon as he could.

Soon...

"Etsuko!" she yells.

"Right…I'm sorry," I sigh.

There's a bit of dead silence between us after that. It amazes me to see her put up such a positive attitude. I shouldn't actually be surprised though, after all it should be easy for her. She has been visited by friends and family and she is getting an incredible amount of support.

Her side of the room is practically filled with flowers, get well cards and balloons. On my side there's only a card over the counter which I have Miki to thank for since she bought it for me. However it's not the lack of people looking for me that gets me down, but the fact that my last few seconds in SAO still haunt me. Aeri…and Elina, for all I know they are both dead and I have no damn way of even knowing where their graves might be. Elina is surely…gone.

"I know you didn't ask me to…" Mio says softly, "but I asked my parents to look for both Eli and Aeri."

"Esra…" I huff, "Why?"

"Try again," she says.

"Why do that, Mio?" I ask, finally looking in her direction.

She bites her lip and rests both of her hands over her lap.

"They were also my friends…and since you told me their real names…" she mumbles, "I want to know if they are alive…I don't want to think they are dead."

I turn from her once again, I'm not in the mood to have this kind of talk. I have actually been actively avoiding it.

"Then at the very least we could fi-"

"Find a grave?!" I growl, "Do you really want that?"

She looks away and closes her hands tightly.

"It would be better than anything!" she says, "I need closure, alright?!"

"I…uh, I'm so sorry," a familiar voice sounds off from my right.

Miki stands in the middle of the door leading into the room, holding it half open. She looks as nervous and shy as usual.

"You have visitors, Yuuji," she says and opens the door.

Behind her walks a girl with short auburn hair. She wears some slightly tattered jeans and bright yellow top. She nervously walks into the room, her eyes are solely fixated on me. Her mouth is open and her eyes are wide, saying that she looks surprised would be an understatement.

"Ruri," I mouth unconsciously.

"Yuuji," the girl says softly.

She walks over to the side of my bed and throws her upper body over me. She knocks the air out of my lungs but I try to downplay it with a loud grunt. She hugs me tightly and I can hear her cry a little. Out of all the people I ever expected to visit me, Ruri was probably not even the first ten people I was expecting. We are close friends, but I would figure she would be busy with other things.

"I'm sorry I didn't come by any sooner," she cries into my chest, "I didn't know what to do!"

I place my right hand around her back and pat her gently.

"It's alright," I says softly.

"Ruri?" Mio asks.

"Not our Ruri…" I mutter, "She is a friend, I knew from before SAO."

Mio nods and stares at me, she is curious, I can tell just from her eyes.

"After Masashi died…I was just so afraid to find out that you died as well…" she bawls.

Charles.

"It's okay…" I huff, trying not to tear up, "It's alright, just please…your shoulder is on my ribs."

She backs away immediately and with a bit of a flustered face apologizes. Mio laughs a bit and that triggers me to also laugh for a short second.

"I'm so glad you are ok," Ruri says.

"I'm glad to finally have a visitor."

"Your dad hasn't come by?!" she asks.

"He isn't in Tokyo…" I answer.

"I'm so glad to finally see Yuuji have some visitors," Miki says with a bright smile as she approaches the other side of the bed, "You three are the first ones to come in to visit him."

"Three?" I ask.

Miki tilts her head and raises an eyebrow like a confused puppy. She blinks all too consciously for a couple of seconds and looks over to the door of the room.

"Aren't those your parents?" she asks.

I look over to the door and see a man and a woman both in gray suits. The man wears glasses and has a bit of a sharp jaw, short black hair and a pacific expression over his face. The woman however is kind of the opposite. Her lips are not making a smile or a frown, but they shine kind of brightly thanks to her bright red selection of lipstick. Unlike her partner she wears a pair of sunglasses that obscure part of her face. Yet there's this professional aura to her thanks to her blonde hair being tied up in a ponytail. On top of that she holds what l appears to be a small tablet under her arm.

"I think we should explain," the man says with a soft tone.

"Who are these people?" Ruri asks me.

"I'm Kikuoka Seijurou and this is a peer of mine, Amori Lynn," he explains, "We are investigators from the Sword Art Online Case Victims Rescue Force."

"Former," the woman butts in.

"Right right, they no longer hold jurisdiction," the man rethinks with a carefree tone, "Allow me to correct myself, we are investigators from the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, also known as the Virtual Spa-"

"Enough of that," the woman interrupts and walks inside the room, "We are here to meet with Mr. Akagi Yuuji."

She walks to stand in between my bed and Mio's and pushes her shades down a bit to take a look at Mio.

"Which I assume is not this girl," Amori says and turns to me, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but your handle all throughout the SAO incident was Alshep, right?"

"What of it?" I answer bitterly.

"Nothing to be alarmed of," the man says and walks closer to me, "We just have to ask you a few questions."

"Nurse…Miki," Amori says, "could you please leave us alone with Mr. Akagi? And please take Mr. Akagi's visitor with you."

Miki does not work under pressure, so she grabs Ruri and with her legs practically shaking she storms out of the room, leaving me and Mio alone with these strange people.

"I'm so sorry, she can be a bit…" Kikuoka mutters.

"Are you sure you want to finish that sentence?" Amori huffs.

"Either way," the man continues with a smile, "I'm sure this will be the first time you hear about this, but we represent an organization that has been looking into the SAO incident in great detail. As of now data mining and inspecting what was left of Argus' servers has left us with minimal information as to what happened inside that virtual hell you were trapped in."

"Basically, we have a puzzle with a ton of missing pieces," Amori says, "And we are trying to fill in the gaps."

"And how exactly do you know my user name?" I ask.

"Part of the minimal information we were able to recover where user names and consequently the information in the accounts they were tied to," Kikuoka says, "Other than that we have a map of sorts…and your name pops in very peculiar places."

Amori raises her tablet and messes around with it for a few seconds before turning it around. The screen displays what looks like a bird's eye view of floor seventeen on the right, multiple dots crowd the map on the right and on the left there is a tab with multiple names and dates. My username is highlighted on the left side.

The woman then selects various tabs with the name Alshep on them and starts to display the maps of multiples boss rooms in which I'm highlighted as a yellow dot amongst several other dots. They must be the survey battles.

"Correct me if I'm wrong Mr. Akagi," Amori says, "But if I understand this information correctly you were in several of the boss rooms along with several other players as they were being discovered right?"

I nod.

"Stop me if I'm if I'm wrong," she says again, "But considering the information we have gathered from other players this makes you a member of the groups that surveyed the boss rooms to collect information to then clear them, right?"

I nod again.

"Again, stop me if I'm wrong," she repeats herself, "but all of the previous things considered along with a few testimonies of other victims, they place your username as the player in charge of leading these battles."

"What are you trying to get at?" I ask.

"We just want some information, that is all," Kikouka says calmly.

"And what do I get in return?" I ask growing a bit tired.

Amori sighs, almost looking disgusted with my answer.

"As with other particularly important players in this incident, we can arrange a monetary compensa-"

"I want you to find some people, can you do that?" I ask, interrupting Amori in the process.

Amori smiles and shuts off her tablet. She removes her shades and crosses her arms, revealing a set of light green eyes.

"How many?" she asks.

"Seven."

"I can do five," she huffs.

"I give you four names and she gives you another four," I say gesturing over to Mio.

I only want to find seven other players, but if I get a better deal I'm sure as hell going get it.

"Three and three," Amori replies.

"Fine," I agree.

Amori turns to Mio and raises her tablet once again.

"Which three people do you want me to find?" Amori asks her.

Mio leans out a little to look at me. I nod at her and she nods back.

"Their usernames are…Sinna, Aereth and Ruri," Mio says, "I'm sure Ruri should know Kayla's real name, that should make Kayla easier to find if we find Ruri first."

Bight as always. I didn't consider the possibility in the slightest. She is right though, with how close Ruri and Kayla were I'm more than sure that they know each other's real names. With that in order I think I'll change my third pick.

Amori turns to me and keeps doing something in her tablet.

"What about you Mr. Akagi?" she asks.

"Kosaka Akari, username Elina," I say first, "Kanda Mirai, username Aeri."

"And last?"

"A man with the username Klaus."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

It felt so freaking odd to write this chapter. From re-reading it it just felt so different from chapters in SAO, it just feels so grounded and uh...grey? If that makes any sense? I love it nevertheless.

**owaychan: **Sorry that you had to wait a bit more, things have been getting a little in the way of me posting chapters early in the morning. **SkySlash9: **I will say this right here just to clear any doubt, I do not intend to make a sequel to this story. However I do want to keep writing and will surely do so here until I have something that is not crap to actually show to a publisher or something haha. We'll see about the letting everyone live soon enough. MUAHAHAHA. **IC0: **HAPPY BIRTHDAY A WEEK LATER! I'm glad you enjoyed it! **Electronic Ink 0: **THERE IS ALWAYS AN AMOUNT OF CAPSLOCK TO DO ANYTHING! Your comment about Elina made me burst out laughing once I read it.

That's it for today! As always if you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all, next week!


	80. Chapter 80 - Aftermaths

**Chapter 80 – Aftermaths**

**December/1****st****/2024**

**Seibo Hospital - Tokyo**

**Mirai**

"I was informed you no longer want to come to therapy."

"I just don't feel like coming by anymore…" I mumble.

My therapist, Miyu crosses her legs and leans back on her chair. In the past month that I decided to frequent her she has never done that. I think my sudden change of heart must have caught her off guard or something. Maybe I'm just overthinking this. Yeah, that must be it.

"That is perfectly fine Mirai, however I do think we should at least have some sort of proper closure to our sessions," she explains, "After all, you were the one that asked for these sessions."

"Is that really necessary?" I ask.

"It is preferable," she says softly, "but, if you wish to leave right now and never come back I'm not going to stop you. However, I do encourage you to reconsider. "

When I woke up the first thing I wanted to do was to get some help regarding Mirai, but ever since I woke up I haven't seen her at all. The first week I felt so on edge, I was trying to talk to her, trying to get her to reply, but it never happened. I should be feeling good that I no longer hear her or see her, but the fact is that I don't. It feels like something is missing, I don't want her back, not in the slightest, but I just feel…odd.

I breathe in deeply and cross my arms. I try to move a little but there is only so much space to move in while on a wheelchair. Miyu's office is really cozy, the rest of the hospital just feels unnecessarily cold, but inside her office it felt a bit warmer. I like it.

"I guess we can talk today," I say nervously, "but…but I don't want to come back after today…please."

She uncrosses her legs and I suddenly feel at ease. She fixes her glasses and rests her arms over the armrests of her chair.

"Yesterday you were talking about your friends in SAO," she starts, "You said one of them has been visiting you."

I nod.

"Yeah, Aere-uh…I mean Haruhiko," I reply.

I notice that she ever so slightly tilts her head as I get Haruhiko's name a bit confused. She tends to pick up every single one of my mistakes like that. I don't really like it, I know she is trying to help me out, but at times it feels more like she is judging me.

"How do you feel about his visits?" she asks.

"It's nice to see a familiar face," I say, "I'm really surprised that he is out and about now. It still hurts for me when I walk for more than a few minutes."

It was weird at first, I was very confused to see him. Even more so cause he looked to be in perfectly fine shape. Definitely a bit thinner than back in SAO, but it was amazing to see him look so similar to the way he looked in game.

"He must've been rather diligent with his rehab exercises," she says.

He was indeed according to what he told me the first day he visited. Apparently it helped that he was in perfectly good physical condition, add on top of that the fact that he constantly exercised before being trapped in SAO.

"Yeah," I say a bit dismissively, "Besides, he's got someone to look for."

"Who might that be?" the therapist asks.

"Our…friend, a friend of ours, her name is Sinna," I say with a smile, "Well not her real name, her real name is Nao. He is trying so hard to find her."

"Were you close with Nao?"

Close is a bit of an understatement in my opinion. I wouldn't say I had a normal friendship with Sinna, our relationship went a little deeper than that I think. I took care of her in a much more personal level; since her sister was murdered I tried to be there for Sinna as much as I thought her sister would. Not that I tried to replace her sister, I never could anyways, not even if I tried. Even with our fallouts I still managed to keep a strong relationship with her. However I'm not about to tell a therapist I almost thought of her as a daughter.

"Very," I mutter.

"Would you say as close as with…" she stops, "Your other friend we talked about…Yuuji, was it?"

"I…uh…well, I think that the type of relationship I had with Yuuji was a completely different thing" I say.

I start rocking myself back and forth a little in my chair. I'm starting to get a bit bored, after all, my plan was only to come by and tell her that I would no longer be coming to our sessions. Miyu realizes I'm starting to get distracted and slowly diverts her eyes to the clock on the wall behind me. I like to think that just as she has picked up on a few things about me I have been able to pick up on a few of hers. She will only check the time if I happen to distract myself. I remain silent and the therapist lets a few minutes go by. She does this often as well; she will rarely break the silence.

"I have some information I want to share with you Mirai," she says.

"What is it?" I ask.

"I have been talking to a number of really knowledgeable people," she explains, "These people all happened to be well informed with what happened in SAO and more or less gave me the information I think I need to give you a bit of closure."

As she finishes her sentence I find myself very intrigued, did she talk to other players? Or perhaps she talked to some expert on the matter? I nod somewhat unconsciously and watch her cross her legs once more.

"The very first thing you told me about was about this girl, this shadow you often saw in SAO," she says, "You told me she often talked to you, teased you and just overall made you have a bad time right? On top of that you decided to name her after the real you while you kept your online handle of Aeri."

"Yeah…" I answer.

"Well, some of the information I had the pleasure of discovering is that the NerveGear you and the other victims were wearing is a pretty interesting piece of technology. Not only did it practically convert every single of your brain waves into the digital world of SAO, but some experts are even theorizing it managed to be affected by the user's emotions."

"What do you mean by that?" I question, "I don't think I understand."

She smiles and leans a bit forward in her chair. She almost looks excited to share this information with me. Yet another thing I've never seen her do, all this time she had kept this formal, almost cold feeling to her person. Not even when I was sharing how I killed several people did she seem to react.

"What I mean is," she pauses, "This horrible, teasing hallucination of yours and the fact that it completely disappeared since you left the world of SAO might mean that you are…well for the lack of better words and to try and appease you, sane. This shadowy, mean version of yourself could have very well been just the work of the NerveGear system reacting to both your emotions and mental stability at the time it all happened."

"But I…you mean, I'm ok?" I ask in disbelief.

It feels weird to hear this, is it really true? It sounds a tad bit convenient, but it's not like I have another answer for it right now. It seems to fit, it feels like it could be true, but is it really?

"Well, I don't want to say you are not, I still strongly urge you to keep coming to our sessions, but with this information and what you have told me about the incident I see no other logic answer than to discard things like schizophrenia or some kind of personality disorder," she says, "Look, Mirai, what I'm trying to say is that you should leave any worries about this shadowy figure and everything you did while inside of SAO behind. I keep using the word victim…and I truly apologize for that, but you are a survivor Mirai. You were thrown into a despicable scenario in which you were forced to take choices, choices that affected your livelihood and your mental state while you were inside that horrible world."

I try to speak but choke with my own words, I clear my throat and look the therapist dead in the eye. She still looks happy and eager to keep talking about this topic in particular; however I have another set of feelings brewing up inside of me.

How can I just forget about what happened? How can I just leave it behind me? Not only did I kill a lot of people, but my actions also took the lives of several of my friends, of people which I held dear in my heart. How in the hell am I supposed to just leave that behind me and stop worrying about it?

"But I…" I choke again, "I…am I allowed to?"

As I finish my question a feel my eyes tearing up. She immediately reaches for a box of tissues on a small stand next to her and gives it to me. I hold the small box and place it over my lap, I still don't grab a tissue, but instead keep waiting for her to answer. I need an answer.

"After all I've done…" I whimper, "Am I really allowed to?"

I don't know if it's just the fact that my eyes are currently crowded with tears, but I swear I can see the therapist's eyes become a bit glassy as she gives me an earnest smile.

"Of course you are," she says softly.

Tear after tear comes rolling down my face; I press my teeth together as I try to silence anything even remotely resembling a sob that tries to come out of my mouth. I grab a couple of tissue out of the box and push them against my eyes, desperately trying to soak up the tears.

"I know it's probably easier said than done, but most things are anyways," she says, "No matter what you did in SAO, I don't think you should be held accountable, you were trapped and as I said forced to make choices you wouldn't otherwise make. So please, Mirai, allow yourself to forget about it, to leave it behind."

If anyone knows that I'm not free of sin is me. I did kill people for the sheer purpose of revenge; I robbed quite a lot of people off their right to live. I'm not a good person, even if I forget about everything I don't think I will ever be able to convince myself that I am good. At the very least I guess I can try.

"Thank you," I smile.

"You don't need to thank me," she replies, "Will I be seeing you soon?"

Of course she wants me to keep coming, even after all her speech about finally being free and letting myself forget. I want to understand where she is coming from, but I just don't. I don't want to talk about anything anymore, I want to leave this damn hospital and the faster I do so, the better I'll be, the safer I'll feel.

"Maybe…" I say slowly, "I'll…I'll think about it ok?"

She nods and smiles, part of me thinks she already knows what is going to happen and perhaps I might come back. I will have a lot to think about before I go to sleep today. Miyu stands up and opens the door of her office for me. Outside is a nurse, her name is Akane, she has been taking care of me ever since I woke up.

Akane comes into the room and quickly places herself behind me to push me out of the room. I wave the therapist goodbye and see her wave back with a smile. As Akane pushes me through the hallway I sigh out loudly.

"How did it go today?" she asks.

"It was good I guess," I mumble, "I just want to get out of here."

"You say the same thing every day," she laughs, "You just have to put more effort in your exercises and I'm sure you'll be able to leave in no time."

"I hope so."

It takes a bit to reach my room. The elevators in the hospital are always in constant use and it takes a rather long time for them to reach floors. I think that is kind of an oversight, this is a hospital after all, what if someone who really needs help has to use the elevator?

After taking the elevator down to the floor where my room is in, Akane pushes me through the hallway. We pass by several other patients that are trying to walk round. I can honestly tell right away they are other SAO survivors, their bodies look weak and they are all particularly thin. It also helps to notice that all of them are trying to walk as if their feet were made out of glass.

Akane opens the door to my room and slowly pushes me in and places me just next to the bed. On the couch next to the bed I can see Haruhiko taking a nap, his face is partially covered by book.

"Huh, your boyfriend is here again," Akane says.

"He is not my…my boyfriend," I squeak.

"I know, I know," Akane laughs, "I'm just teasing. Want me to help you into bed or are you going to try by yourself?"

"I'll try doing it myself," I answer and place both of my hands on the armrests of the wheelchair.

I push myself up and immediately feel uncomfortable with my own weight. I take a few deep breaths and slowly place my right foot ahead of my left one. It's a weird pain to describe, I think the only thing I can even begin to compare it to would be the feeling you get on your legs if you've skipped working out your legs at the gym for more than a week. They just feel weak and unsteady it's really annoying, and it feels a ton worse than that example.

I move my left foot and finally let go of the chair and reach out for the bed with my hands. I grip the sheets and almost feel myself falling backwards but manage to throw my upper body over the bed.

"You almost got it," I hear Haruhiko say.

"Shu-shut up," I breathe.

"I'm not teasing you," he answers, "Come on, you are almost there."

"Not everyone was in peak physical condition before being in a coma for two years, you dumbass," I whine and with all my strength manage to push the rest of my body over the bed.

I feel exhausted by the time I turn around finally manage to sit up in bed. I really need to stop slacking with my rehab therapy.

"Seriously though," I say as I take in a deep breath, "How the hell are you even able to walk around properly?"

"Well it helps to do your exercises every day, it also helps that my parents didn't keep me in the hospital for long and I was able to let myself out even when the staff advised me not to."

"I thought that the ministry of whatever was covering the expenses," I say, "Wait! You are not even supposed to be out and about yet?"

"Well yeah, the reason isn't really about money, but my parents didn't even find out I was in a coma…" he says, "I owe it all to my boss who decided to visit me after two days of not going to work. That man literally saved my life. Also, of course not, I'm still weak as all hell, but I'll be damned if I stayed another day at that damn hospital, besides I need to find Nao."

He told me something about how he found me. He said that he was contacted by a group of investigators that apparently represented the ministry of communications. They wanted to ask a few questions to Haruhiko, regarding his location in several floors of Aincrad in certain dates. He agreed to give them information in exchange of finding both me and Nao. I guess the only reason he is here right now is because they found me first.

"So why are those dudes having trouble finding her?" I ask.

"Well, the last I heard was because it seems Nao might have lied in the information tied to her account," he says, "After all, she wasn't even supposed to be in the game due to the age rating. So that's why they are having trouble finding her, the username Sinna was tied to a name that didn't appear in any of the hospital records. I wish they contacted me again so I could give them her real name now that you told a few days ago."

I haven't been contacted by these people, but Haruhiko told me I might be in the future. After all the reason why he was contacted in the first place was apparently because he was the first person to set foot on floor seventy four. So if that is really all it takes I might just be contacted to talk about how and why I was one of the first players on floor forty nine.

"Well I'll leave you two alone," Akane says and leaves the room.

"Thank you, Akane," I say softly.

"I'll see you in a bit," she answers.

I cover myself with the sheets on the bed and lie down on my back. I close my eyes and try to focus on breathing in and out slowly.

"You cried," Haruhiko mutters, "Didn't you?"

"Yeah…" I admit.

"Wanna talk about it?" he asks.

"I would rather not."

"Alright," he huffs.

He's been a pleasant company to have around. My mother and sister are super busy with work so they usually come and visit later at night. Having Haruhiko here is really nice, I can talk to him and keep busy for the time he is here…I like that.

"Do you think the others are ok?" I ask.

"I'm…I'm sure they are all fine," he says, "I just wish I could've asked those guys to find more of our friends."

The door suddenly slams open, making me open my eyes and sit up almost immediately. A terrible idea on my end as I feel a huge pain across my lower back once I'm sitting up.

"Kanada!" I hear a woman scream.

No way.

Tokegawa and her assistant Kyoko burst into the room. Tokegawa hasn't changed at all, she still looks beautiful and absurdly regal. I swear to god Kyoko is still wearing the same outfit I last saw her in. After all if I remember correctly Tokegawa strictly made her dress like a secretary. Grey skirt, a black blouse and high heels that's pretty much Kyoko's daily outfit.

"Tokegawa!" I say, my voice cracking a little from the effort.

Her expression immediately changes to one of disgust as she places her hand over her chest.

"Oh my, I certainly hope that horrible pitch was just a one-time thing," she complains.

"Oh screw you," I laugh.

She smiles and rushes over to me.

"I'm glad to see you still have that lovely attitude of yours," she chuckles.

Out of nowhere she leans in close and hugs me tightly. Never in the time I spent working with her did she ever hug me. A handshake or a high five were rare enough with her. A hug just makes me hug her back with all my strength.

"I'm sorry I didn't come by sooner," she says softly, "I was out of the country."

"It's ok," I stifle a bit, "I missed you I guess."

She backs away with a bit of a frown and crosses her arms.

"You guess?" she whines.

"I'm kidding," I smile.

Kyoko looks super excited to see me, but unlike Tokegawa she just waves at me from the entrance of the room. Her eyes are practically beaming.

Tokegawa finally notices Haruhiko and strikes a rather intimidating pose in his direction.

"And who is this?" Tokegawa asks, "Your boyfriend?"

"He is not!" I squeak again.

Haruhiko laughs and stand up to greet Tokegawa.

"Okui Haruhiko," he says, "I'm a friend of hers."

"He was actually with me in SAO," I explain.

"I see," Tokegawa replies.

"So are you like an aunt or something?" Haruhiko asks.

"I'm her boss, boy," she replies nonchalantly.

I guess I never told anyone other than Daath and Yuuji what my line of work used to be. I bet it's going to go around as a bit of surprise.

"I'm…sort of an idol…well was…" I admit.

"Idol…?" he mouths looking very surprised, "Like a singing, dancing, music stuff idol?"

Both Tokegawa and I nod. Haruhiko's cheeks blow up with air and then he starts laughing loudly.

"I don't believe you," he says still laughing like an idiot.

Tokegawa pulls out her cellphone and shows it to Haruhiko.

"I do not lie, boy!" she says sounding a bit angry.

Haruhiko holds Tokegawa's phone close to his face. He looks back and forth between me and the phone a couple of times. He smiles in a bit of a mocking manner and raises his eyebrows in surprise.

"Never in a million years would I have guessed," he says as he holds the urge to laugh back.

I reach out to him and take the phone away from him.

"Hey?!" Tokegawa says as she tries to snatch the phone away from my hands.

The phone is on Tokegawa's lock screen in which the background happens to be a picture of a day I remember fondly. The picture is a selfie in which both Tokegawa and Kyoko take most of the screen up while I'm trying to get a hold of Tokegawa's phone since I was a bit embarrassed of the outfit she order for my first live performance. I smile at the phone and give it back to Tokegawa.

"I just never got around to changing my background…" she mumbles.

"Here I thought you were always all cold and stuff," I tease.

"The boss has the mushiest of hearts," Kyoko adds.

"Shut it Kyoko!"

"I'm sorry boss," she apologizes.

The door suddenly slams open once again.

"Aeri!" yet another familiar voice screams.

"Mr. Akagi, one does not scream inside a hospital," another voice says.

Akagi…It's Yuuji.

In comes Yuuji, a sight for sore eyes. He is holding himself up thanks to a cane on his left hand and slowly inches his way closer to my bed.

"Al!" Haruhiko exclaims, "Oh man is it good to see you!"

"Aereth?!" Yuuji replies, "Holy shit, I found two of you!"

A woman in a grey suit comes in after Yuuji and removes a pair of shades she is wearing. She lets her blonde hair down and moves her head in a bit of an exaggerated way as to make her hair dance a little.

"I believe what Mr. Akagi meant by that was that he is glad to have found two of his friends," she says, clearly bothered by Yuuji's language.

"Yuuji," I say softly and like try to stand up.

My leg cramps up a bit as stand up and Yuuji reaches out to me to hold me up a bit.

"Easy there," he says with a smug grin.

"I really missed that stupid smile of yours," I say.

"I really missed you insulting me," he replies.

Yuuji helps me sit back down on my bed and then joins Haruhiko on the couch. They both sit together and we catch up a bit. Yuuji was also contacted by the ministry; they also wanted some information of him since they have identified him as the leader of multiple survey battles into boss rooms. He managed to get a deal with the woman escorting him.

It doesn't surprise me that he would do something like this, go out of his way to try and find us. It's just something he would do.

"Esra is actually in the same hospital I was in," he says, "Well uh…Mio her real name is Mio. Oh my god I should get her to visit you soon."

"How are you out right now?" Haruhiko asks.

"Well, it's all thanks to Lynn," Yuuji says and gestures to the woman in the suit, "She authorized my exit of the hospital, I shouldn't be out right now, but I got tired of waiting, even more so when they told they had found you."

He stops for a second and smile widely while putting his hand over Haruhiko's shoulder.

"I'm so freaking glad I found you two," he says.

This Lynn woman pulls out her phone and quickly presses it on her ear.

"Lynn," she says.

I can't help but feel she is just a bit too arrogant.

"Yeah, ok, alright," she drones, "I guess I'll tell him. Yeah, ok…talk to you later."

She puts her phone down and pushes it into one of her pockets. She pats down her suit and with a bit of sigh turns to us.

"Mr. Akagi, I have some news," she says, "It turns out Ms. Kosaka was in fact in Tama Central as you told us in the beginning."

"Who?" Haruhiko asks.

"Elina," Yuuji answers quickly.

Lynn takes out her cellphone once again and starts getting a bit distracted by it. Or at least I think so, she is viciously tapping on her screen.

"Is she…alive?" Yuuji asks cautiously.

"Very much so Mr. Akagi," Lynn replies.

"Christ, lead with that!" he complains.

How is that possible? I watched her die, she died right in front of my eyes. This is amazing, she still alive! But…how?

"You want to go and see her?" Lynn asks, "She isn't far away."

* * *

It took a lot of convincing, but with this Lynn girl and Tokegawa it was just a matter of time before the hospital staff let me out to go with both Yuuji and Haruhiko. I guess it kind of pays to be friends with scary looking ladies.

A car picked us up at the hospital, whoever this Lynn woman is she has some high tier contacts. I have never been a girl to know a lot about cars, but I can tell a fancy car when I see one. Even more so when the inside has a couple of glasses, alcohol and refreshments for the people inside. It takes a little over half an hour to reach another hospital, to be precise and according to Lynn the Tokyo Metropolitan Neurological Hospital.

"Aren't you freaking out?" I ask Yuuji as I sit down on a wheel chair Lynn was kind enough to get for me, "I'm freaking out."

"I'm trying to keep it together don't make me freak out as well," he says a bit bitterly.

"You two calm down, be happy for god's sake, she is alive and we are going to see her," Haruhiko says, "If anything let's get excited."

Haruhiko starts pushing me along as Yuuji walks to the hospital's entrance. Lynn is leading us in as she knows where Eli is and will get us through security with no questions asked. It in a way feels a bit fishy but if it means we get to see Eli I wouldn't mind breaking a law or two myself.

We get on an elevator and ride it to the third floor. It leads right into a long hallway with rooms and Lynn quickly leads us to room number thirty five.

"I was told she should be in here," Lynn says, "Please take your time Mr. Akagi."

"Alright," Yuuji says slowly and places his hand on the handle of the door.

He stops for a few second and I can clearly see him swallow his own spit. He's nervous that much is obvious.

"Come on!" I say cheerfully.

"Right!" he says spastically and opens the door.

He walks in slowly and Haruhiko pushes me right behind him. As we come in we can see a girl sitting up in her bed. Part of her head is covered in bandages and she is looking away from us, staring out the window.

"Akari…" Yuuji says softly.

The girl slowly turns hear head around. It's definitely her, I could recognize her face anywhere. It's Eli, I'm so glad.

"Hi!" she says with a big smile.

"I'm so glad you are ok!" Yuuji cries as he hugs her.

She appears to be a little confused as she doesn't wrap her arms around Yuuji, instead she just laughs a bit awkwardly.

"I'm glad I'm ok too, haha" she laughs and holds her left hand to her head.

Yuuji stops hugging her and backs away a little bit to give her some space. She looks at me and Haruhiko and tilts her head as if confused. She then returns her sight to Yuuji and tilts her head as well.

"Who are you though?"

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Once again I'm sorry about the late update. I had a really crappy night last night and instead of waking up early to proofread this chapter I wake up just a few hours ago. Nevertheless here is today's chapter! I'm expecting to get an angry PM or two regarding the ending of this chapter, but I'm ready for that...maybe.

**BrokeN'Clear: **I like your user name and I'm also glad to see that you enjoy reading this story! Thank you so much for your support! **Guest: **Glad to see I wasn't the only one with that feeling. And yeah geez I even found myself writing their usernames when I should have written the real ones haha. Also yeah Kikouka is probably one of the sketchiest characters in the whole series. **owaychan: **I'm so sorry I kept you waiting today as well...hope you liked it though! **SkySlash9: **One of the things that bothered me the most about the ending of the SAO arc was just that. Kirito just freaking gets up and starts legging it. Which if you consider everything wouldn't exactly be impossible due to the nervegear sleep not actually being a coma, but goddamn him just waking up like he did is plain bullpoop. **Electronic Ink 0: **Yeah, SAO is surely more interesting and vivid than the real world and I think I even more or less managed to capture that with my flashback chapters. I always tried to give them that...uh grey tone hahaha. **OneTiredSloth: **MY SLOTH FRIEND! Don't worry about not leaving a review, although I'm glad to see you again. I will keep on keeping on!

Thank you so much for reviewing the last chapter guys! I think it's the most individual reviews I've gotten ever!

As always if you like what you read please leave a review!

This is all for today, I will see you all next week!


	81. Chapter 81 - Grim Respite

**Chapter 81 – Grim Respite**

**December/1****st****/2024**

**Tokyo Metropolitan Neurological Hospital - Tokyo**

**Yuuji**

She is joking, she must be joking, there's just no way. It has to be a joke, it just has to be. A sudden lightheadedness overcomes me, a mixture of both dizziness and pain. It's hard for me to attribute the feelings to anything other than the response I just got from Elina.

"It's...me, Yuuji…" I say softly.

"I'm sorry," she says as she holds her hands together, "My family told me I was in an accident not long ago…I might not remember a lot of things."

The dizziness turns into a sharp headache, my throat ties itself into a nasty knot and to further make things worse I start going back to every single memory I have of her…with her.

"But…I…I know you, we were together for the past two years…" I say and turn to Mirai and Haruhiko who are both standing not far behind me, "Loo-look I even brought them with me, do you remember them? It's Aeri and Aereth!"

I struggle to even generate the simplest of words. I stutter as I feel shivers going up and down my spine. She is joking, it's all just a joke. She turns her head a little bit and focuses on both Mirai and Haruhiko.

"I…I don't know who you people are…" she says softly, "I'm so sorry…"

The way she says this hurts in a very special way. She is truly apologizing for not knowing who we are. It almost looks like it pains her as well. It hurts.

"Who are these people?!" A voice asks as it enters the room.

A woman resembling Akari quite a bit in her likeness rushes over to the bed and stands between me and Akari. It must be her sister. I remember Akari mentioning she had a sister. The woman looks very defensive; she stands between me and Akari almost as if her life depended on it.

"Sis, you are back," Akari says with a smile, "These people are saying they know me. Do you know them? Are they my friends?"

"I don't know who they are…uhm, maybe…" the woman stops abruptly, "Do you know my sister? From uh…the accident?"

The emphasis put on accident makes me uncomfortable as I realize Akari doesn't even know what happened to her, what happened to all of us. I nod in the sister's direction and she nods back.

"I see," she answers, "Who are you then?"

"My name is Haruhiko," Haruhiko says and then gestures to Mirai just in front of him, "This is Mirai, we are friends of your sister. This here is Yuuji, he is actually your sister's bo-"

"I'm a friend…just a friend as well," I interrupt Haruhiko.

"Could we maybe, talk outside?" the sister proposes.

Reluctantly we all agree and step outside the room as Akari waves each one of us goodbye. As we exit I notice Haruhiko and Mirai giving me odd looks and I know exactly why. Once outside I notice that Lynn is keeping close to the room, she is on her cellphone right now, but I'm sure once she is done she will join us in the conversation whether we want it or not.

"So…you know my sister from SAO?" she asks us.

"Yeah, we've known her for two years," Mirai says, "Yuuji knows her from day one, he's been by her side ever since then."

"Anyone can come by and say that," the sister says.

"Her name is Kosaka Akari," I say and lean on the wall just next to the room's door, "She…she can't move from the waist down ever since she was in a car accident with her dad."

"What?" Mirai recoils quickly.

"Christ…" Haruhiko mumbles.

That's right, after all no one else knew about that but me. Akari chose to confide in me a while after we met. Akari's sister's face twists as I'm sure I evoke some harsh memories through the information I know thanks to my time with Akari.

"That is private enough…" she says, "Who are you, really?"

"Just a friend," I mutter, nearly biting my tongue in the process.

The sister quickly focuses on me, analyzing every inch of my being. As any worried sister would, after all I've never been a person that looks friendly. Let alone how can I even begin to explain that I was in a romantic relationship with her sister?

"I'm not the best person to explain this…" the sister says, "I'm no doctor after all, but she has some sort of amnesia. She doesn't remember her time in SAO nor does she seem to remember anything from two months before that."

"That's a huge gap…" Haruhiko says.

I'm saddened by the news I receive, but I'm also curious. I have a million questions about what exactly happened to Elina, for instance how is she even alive? I'm sure at least Mirai shares some of my curiosity, yet for some reason Haruhiko also seems to be quite perplexed by the situation. After all, he doesn't exactly know what went down when both Mirai and I went to meet Klaus.

"It's a very unique case according to her doctor, apparently her NerveGear activated as she was being disconnected from the game," she explains, "There's some damage to her frontal lobe, on top of trauma from the whole experience and…it's just hard for them to exactly pin point what is causing the amnesia. The bandages on her head are because of a surgery she had to go through…because of the damage the NerveGear caused her brain."

Of course nothing can ever go smoothly; even surviving the whole ordeal has to come with surprises and pain. This is all Klaus' fault, I just need to wait for Lynn to find that bastard, only then can I make him pay. I don't care if he is alive or not, with amnesia or not. I will make sure that bastard pay.

"Is it permanent?" Mirai asks.

"We don't know," the sister says as she grabs her own arm, "The doctors don't know. I'm trying to jog her memories on a few things, but it's really hard and the doctor says not to try too hard."

"Maybe…we can do something about that?" Haruhiko says, "After all we did spend a lot of time with her in SAO. Maybe we can talk to her about some things that happened in there?"

"I would rather you didn't," the sister answers.

I feel my eyebrows dip and my eyes narrow practically in an unconscious manner. At the same time I notice Haruhiko and Mirai exchanging confused glances. The sister herself said it, she has been trying to jog her memory in order to remember things, why not let us do that since we practically know everything that happened to her in the past two years?

"But we can help," I protest, "We were with her the whole time."

"I don't know exactly what happened inside SAO, but I know it wasn't anything pleasant," she says, "Even if you are her best friends, even if you knew her for all the time she was asleep, even if you are actually able to help her…I would rather she doesn't remember anything about her time inside that horrible game of death."

I close my hands into fists, gripping my cane with my left hand with extreme force and slam my right hand against the wall.

"That's not fair!" I scream, "Who the hell are you to choose whether she remembers or not?!"

"Mr. Akagi please refrain from screaming inside the hospitals," Lynn comments.

"Shut the hell up!" I scream in her direction and turn to the sister once more, "You can't just chose to let her forget about these past two years, pleasant or not!"

"I'm her sister!" she replies with a frown and takes a few steps closer to me.

She points at me with her index finger and pokes me chest, pushing me against the wall in the process. It really isn't that much physicality, but with my body being weak the simple forceful poke hurts as my body unwillingly leans further against the wall.

"And as such I get to choose what's better for her, and I choose that it's better for her to forget about a the damn prison she was in for the last two years," she yells, "I'm sorry if you are her best friends in life right now, but I choose not to let her remember about it all! Especially when it was my fault in the first place!"

"Your fault?" Mirai asks.

It seems like in her anger, Akari's sister decided to go on and have a bit of an overshare regarding the current situation. I can almost see the sister's hair stand on edge as Mirai asks her question.

"You three, leave, right now!" she demands.

"Can we at least say goodbye?" Mirai says.

It takes Akari's sister a minute to answer, her expression is one of anger, she just wants us gone right now. It's my fault for talking to her like I did. The sister crosses her arms and then looks away from all of us with a childish pout.

"Make it quick," she says.

Not waiting for Haruhiko to push her, Mirai rolls herself to the door and pushes it open. Haruhiko quickly comes to her aid and holds the door open as she rolls herself in. I linger close to Akari's sister for a moment and then let myself in as I watch her stay outside.

"I would want to see you again…at some other time," Mirai says.

"You can't stay?" Akari asks.

"No, not right now," Mirai replies.

"I can give you my email, or something," Akari says.

"That would be awesome," Mirai smiles as she takes out her cellphone.

I hesitate in my approach, I just watch as both Mirai and Akari exchange email addresses. What can I even say to her? Hello, over the last year and half I was your boyfriend, but I can no longer see you because your sister doesn't want you to remember. It's not fair, it's not fucking fair.

"My phone just died," Haruhiko says, "so I guess I'll get your address later."

"Sure thing!" Akari says, "Maybe you guys can help me remember some stuff."

"I really hope so," Haruhiko replies sounding extremely sad.

He takes hold of Mirai's chair and slowly turns her around to leave the room.

"Take care," he says.

I'm left alone in the entrance of the room. She is looking at me with curious eyes and a bit of a smile. Kind of reminds me when I first met her. She's always been bright about any kind of situation. Even right now with half of her head covered in bandages and bound to bed she can smile. She can smile to a stranger like me.

I get closer to her and sit myself on the very edge of her bed by her feet.

"I'm sorry I can't remember you," she says, "It feels like…like…nevermind…"

"What is it?" I ask.

"You are going to think it's dumb," she blushes slightly.

I chuckle softly.

"I'll try not to laugh," I joke.

She pouts and crosses her arms. I apologize and ask her to tell me once more.

"It feels like we were close…" she says with an awkward smile, "You rushed to hug me, the others didn't."

I swallow my own spit and shake my head.

"You and are were just friends, like those two…" I lie, "I guess…I just missed you the most."

"Oh, I see," she tilts her head with yet another bright smile, "Are you leaving right now as well?"

I turn away from her as a few tears escape my eye out of their own volition. I wipe them away with my hand, but I can feel more of them coming.

"Yeah," I grunt and get up.

I turn to her with teary eyes and cough to clear my throat.

"You take ca-"

"Why are you crying?" she interrupts me.

She asks her question as I single tears rolls down her cheek. She quickly notices only to wipe it away with a confused expression. She stares at the hand she just used to wipe away her tear and then looks at me with a hint of worry.

"Why are you crying?" I tease.

"I…I don't know," she replies.

"Take care, Akari," I say and give her my back to walk out of the room.

I'm running away. I lashed out with her sister earlier, but know I can see why she would rather have Akari not remember anything of it. This way she doesn't have to know about all the pain she went through while in SAO. She doesn't have to remember any of her friends dying, she doesn't have to remember the fact that while in there she was able to walk, she doesn't have to remember that I cheated on her. She can be happy this way, or at least I would like to think so. Maybe it isn't fair for all of us, but maybe this way she can avoid all the pain and suffering.

Once outside the room I hug the wall once more and slide down until I'm sitting. I see Akari's sister shoot me an angry glance as she disappears through the door. Then I just hold my head as I can feel myself succumb to my feelings once again, crying and sobbing like some kind of pathetic idiot.

"Why did you lie about who you were?!" Mirai asks, "You are her boyfriend!"

"I…I can't, it's not right," I answer.

"Why?!" she insists.

"Mirai, knock it off…" Haruhiko mutters.

"No!" she says, "Why didn't you say anything about that?! Maybe that could've helped her remember or something! Go kiss her or something maybe that can hel-"

"It's not right Mirai…please shut up," I huff.

"It's not fair, you have to tell her!"

"And what do I tell her?" I ask and look up at her, "That she used to love? So she still should?"

She purses her lips and then leans back on her chair, visibly admitting her defeat in the small and stupid argument.

"Mr. Akagi, if I may," Lynn butts in.

Her timing is just fucking impeccable sometimes.

"What is it?" I ask.

"I was told to ask you some more questions, you know, for investigation purposes," she says, "On top of that I have more news."

The woman in a suit offers me her hand to stand up and I promptly grab it to get back on my feet. I steady the cane on my side and start following her as she leads us down the hallway.

"Did you find someone else?" I ask.

"Indeed we did," she says, "He is right here, two floors above."

I only asked her to find one other man. I once again find myself gripping my cane with excessive force. I stop myself and look behind me. Haruhiko has his hands behinds Mirai's chair, practically waiting for us to move on in order to push her.

"Mirai, come with me," I order.

"Should I come with?" Haruhiko asks.

"No…no, it's alright," Mirai says as she rolls herself towards me, "I'll see you later, ok?"

Mirai approaches me with a bit of a confused expression and once she is close enough I hand her my cane. Still puzzled she takes hold of it, I use her chair to steady myself and push her behind Lynn who is waiting for the elevator to this floor to arrive.

"You asked them to find him…huh?" Mirai asks.

"I had to," I answer.

"What do you plan on doing?" she asks quietly.

"I don't know yet, but it's not going to be pretty."

Watching her from behind I see her not being able to get a comfortable hold of my cane, it almost seems like she is very uncomfortable just holding it.

"What if we just go for coffee or something?" she proposes, "Maybe we can eat something, I saw some nice looking restaurants on the way over here. A break from hospital food could be nice, huh?"

It feels like she is trying to avoid this, but if anyone needs to know what became of Klaus it's her. If anyone deserves to do anything to that piece of shit more than anyone it's her. The elevator dings as it arrives and Lynn moves to the doors as they open. She places her arm over the sensor of the elevator and beckons us over. I push Mirai in and turn her around to face the doors.

"Al…I mean…uh, Yuuji, I don't know about this," she says, sounding out of breath.

"It'll be alright," I mumble.

She turns her head and looks up at me; it looks like she wants to say something else, but then just looks back down as she fiddles with her fingers.

"Mr. Akagi," Lynn says.

"Yeah?"

"Did you have any run-ins with a group that called themselves Laughing Coffin?" she asks.

Impeccable timing.

"We did," I answer, not even turning my head to face her.

"We?" she echoes.

"This girl here was in my guild during my time in SAO," I explain.

"Yuuji…" Mirai mutters.

"Her and I have a bit of history with this group you are mentioning," I say.

"Would you care to elaborate?" she asks, "We have been encountering this name several times with other survivors, it would seem they were a group concentrated on only doing harm to others."

"For a very long time we hunted them," I answer, "We dedicated our time to finding them and killing them."

"Yuuji…stop," Mirai mutters.

"That is a bold statement, Mr. Akagi," Lynn replies and crosses her arms, "So it's safe to assume that you and this girl tried to become some sort of vigilantes? What's the term? Player Killer Killers?"

I turn my head to Lynn and narrow my eyes a bit.

"I guess that would be safe to assume," I answer, "What else do you want to know?"

She takes out her tablet and starts tapping and swiping at it for a few seconds. The elevator finally arrives to the floor Lynn pressed and she reaches out for the emergency stop button, leaving the doors to the elevator less than half open.

"If it's ok I would like to ask you a few more questions," she says.

"You didn't exactly phrase that as a question," I huff.

"I did not," she smiles.

Mirai has been silent ever since her last plea for me to stop. Now she is only looking down at her feet as she holds my cane. There's more to Lynn that meets the eye I'm sure of that, I'm actually sure that her objective is something other than just investigating the incident. There's something that's just fishy about these ministry investigators.

"The other times we have talked you never mentioned this group," Lynn says, "Is there any reason you chose to hide this information from me?"

"I didn't hide it," I huff, "You just didn't ask the right questions."

"Mr. Akagi, now is not the time to be cheeky," she complains, "We need to do all we can to identify the individuals in this group."

"Why?" I ask, "Are you going to jail them or something?"

The idea itself I think to be very stupid. I did tell Lynn I had to kill some players in order to survive myself and she mentioned that anyone involved in the incident would not and could not be held accountable for murder given the fact that we were forced into a "hostile environment" as she calls it. What good will come from her and her group of investigators being able to identify them?

"We just wish to establish a database to keep our eyes on the important players," she admits, "As I said, it would be near impossible to send anyone involved in the incident to court, but the one thing we can do is keep an eye on the mayor offenders."

A big brother type of deal, huh? I think now it's safe to assume that I'm on the watch list she is so casually mentioning. After all, I have been from the start. That must have been why they contacted me to begin with.

"Did you participate in the conjoined attempt to wipe this group out?" Lynn asks, "We have found out that several important guilds and other minor ones were all involved in a type of coalition to get rid of Laughing Coffin."

"I organized it," Mirai speaks up.

"Interesting, Ms. Kanada, right?" Lynn mumbles, and swipes a few more times on her tablet, "Stop me if I'm wrong, but your user name was Aeri, right?"

"What of it?" she spits.

"We have also noticed you appear to be in some particularly interesting places during your time in SAO," Lynn mentions.

"Good for you," Mirai seethes, "I do not have a deal with you, so I'll refrain from answering any of your stupid questions."

"That is only fair, I suppose," Lynn replies.

Lynn leans back and releases the stop button for the elevator, finally allowing for the doors to open. She once again stretches her hand and covers the sensor for the doors.

"Mr. Akagi, I will be waiting right here for when you two are ready to leave," she says, "I think I will have several other questions, this short talk has been…enlightening. Your friend is on room fifty one."

That's also right, I never did tell Lynn who Klaus was, and she must still think he is just another friend I'm trying to find. I push Mirai out of the elevator as Lynn's tone suddenly makes me want to get the hell away from her. I steer Miria's chair to the right and with a bit of struggle start making our way down the hallway. The room happens to be the one closest to the elevator and still using Mirai's chair as support I move myself to open the door.

I feel my hands and legs shake as I push Mirai into the room. This is it, this is finally it. The only sound I'm able to hear is the one of my heart which seems to be pounding loudly right in my ears. Mirai is once again looking at her feet, but this time she seems to be shaking as well. I feel an odd relief as I find her to be in some sort of synch with me.

We slowly make out a single bed with man on it; he's wearing an oxygen tube on his nose and seems to be lying still. The vitals monitor just next to his bed slowly beeps along with his heart as we make our approach.

Once next to the bed I'm able to clearly make out his face, it's him, the only thing the bastard is missing is his stupid red hair. I see my hand reaching out to him, but stop when I notice something is amiss. His eyes are wide open and he seems to be staring into nothing. I take a step back and notice that his chest isn't rising as he breathes; the oxygen tube seems to be doing the breathing for him.

"What's wrong with him?" Mirai asks.

"I…uh…" I stammer and wave my hand mere inches away from his face.

No reaction at all from Klaus' part. I notice a clipboard hanging from the side of his bed and reach for it. His real name is Daichi, the rest of the information looks like gibberish to me as it's flooded with medical terms I honestly cannot understand. However a part towards the end I am able to understand.

"Patient is currently in a vegetative state," I say out loud.

In a sick and morbid way I find myself smiling as I read that last part. This must be some type of karma. Me killing him in game resulted in this. I put the clipboard down and chuckle briefly as I make my way to the nearby wall. I lean on it and start thinking back to what this pathetic man meant to me in the past two years. To see the very image that haunted me depending on machines to keep living makes me feel…great. I came into this room with ill thoughts, I thought about beating the shit out of him when I found him, but now that feeling is gone, it's completely gone.

I turn to Mirai and her shaking; her whole body seems to be shaking uncontrollably in front of Klaus' bed. I hear a bit of a cry coming from her and decide to approach her, but as soon as I take a step in her direction she starts to laugh. She laughs with no control over her volume and dropping my cane she reaches for her head with her hands. The image evokes a very vivid memory and sends a chill down my spine.

"You don't get off that easily," she laughs and with shaking legs she stands up from her chair, "You don't get to be a fucking vegetable after all you fucking did to me!"

She steadies herself on the edge of Klaus' bed and slowly clambers over him. I make an attempt to get her off the man, but she reacts by pushing me away. Not being ready for that I fall on the ground as I watch her raise both of her hands over her head and drop them down on Klaus' face as fists.

I flinch a little as I see her fists collide with the face of this unconscious man. I stand up with wobbly legs and keep my distance from Mirai. She viciously keeps beating his face to a pulp. According to the monitor Klaus' heart rate starts jumping a bit with every punch Mirai delivers.

"It's not fair!" she screams as she swings her right arm.

I feel like I should do something, but at the same time I don't want to stop her. I raise my hand towards her but then bring it down as I swallow my own spit. Slowly Klaus' face starts getting deformed, punch after punch it even looks like he begins to bruise.

"I'm going to fucking kill you!" Mirai screams.

That alone breaks me away from my moment of hesitation and I grab her from behind. I wrap my arms around her waist and start pulling on her. She starts breathing in and out through her nose and to grunt and groan like some kind of animal. While trying to get her to back off I see her scratch Klaus' unresponsive face with her nails.

"Get away from him!" A nurse orders as she enters the room.

"No! No!" Mirai cries, "I need to kill him, I need to kill him!"

I finally yank her away from Klaus' body and we both fall on the floor. I crash down and my back slams against the nearby wall as I still hold Mirai in my arms. Her whole body is shaking as her laughter slowly drowns into cries. She keeps saying the same thing over and over.

"I need to kill him…" she sobs, "I need to…"

"Call security!" the nurse screams as she starts to tend to Klaus.

"He needs to die Al, we need to kill him," she keeps crying, "It's not fair that he doesn't get to suffer!"

"Calm down," I say softly next to her ear, "It's alright, he has it worse than us right now. He will never bother anyone again."

I hold her close and see that her knuckles have become a little bloody from hitting Klaus over and over. She slowly turns around and hugs me, hiding her face in my chest.

"Mr. Akagi, it would be wise for us to leave," Lynn says as she enters the room, "Now."

She helps both Mirai and I back on our feet and practically drags us away from the room. She gets on her phone and tells the driver to be ready to leave as she presses the button to call the elevator. As I'm struggling to keep both Mirai and myself on our feet all I keep hearing from her is one thing.

"It's not fair…"

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

I didn't get as much flak as I expected from the amnesia thing, yeah it's cliche as hell I will admit that, but I really need it in my story for the ending I've had in my mind since forever to work. I don't have much to say about this chapter, BUT I will say that there is only three more chapters to this story, maybe two if I decided one of them just feels like filler stuff...SO YEAH! We are close to end, so freaking close now, I want to cry.

**SkySlash9: **Yeah, geez, to be honest I considered killing her for the longest time, but this story has enough sadness as it is. Killing Elina wouldn't only make Yuuji miserable, it would make EVERYONE miserable. **OneTiredSloth: **SLOTH FRIEND! As I said I only have at best three more weeks worth of stuff for you guys. ; - ; Thank you so much for your support. **owaychan: **Looking back to my other chapters I notice that I have probably an unhealthy amount of cliffhangers, however it has kept some of you guys coming back every week, so it probably wasn't that bad haha. **Electronic Ink 0: **NO, YOU ARE MAGNIFICENT! Haha, I'm actually really happy to hear how the last bit of the chapter made you react. It's just what I wanted to be honest, so yay. And yeah...I have an unhealthy addiction with cliffhangers as you have grown to probably expect. (P.S. I have been fucking up several times while writing the names in the last few chapters I keep writing Aeri instead of Mirai and the such although sometimes it is intentional for the dialogue I'm trying to make.) **IC0: **I sort of thought it was you, but I thought it would be weird if I made the assumption. DOES THIS SATISFY THE LACK OF BEING-BATSHIT-FUCKING-INSANE? Come on, I was not letting her off the hook that easily. (P.S. kukuku is the best kind of weeb tongue laugh.)

That is all for today! As always if you like what you read please leave a review, and if you don't you can as well!

I will see you all next week!


	82. Chapter 82 - Warmth

**Chapter 82 – Warmth**

**December/31****st****/2024**

**Tōkyōtosaiseikai Central Hospital - Tokyo**

**Ran**

"I'm back," My aunt announces as she enters the room.

I exit the dumb game I was playing on my phone and lock the screen as I turn to face the door leading to my room.

"Can we leave yet?" I whine as I kick my feet up and down under the sheets.

"Yeah, yeah," she sighs, "We just have to come down to the lobby and they will officially release you. I have to sing a few things I guess."

"You make it sound like a prison," I say.

"Weren't you the one complaining day in and day out that it felt like so?"

"I guess you are right about that…hehe."

She walks over to the small couch next to my bed and picks up her purse. She starts digging through it, looking for something. After a few seconds of tossing stuff around inside the purse she turns to me with her phone on her hand.

"Besides I have a surprise for you," she says as she puts the phone to her ear.

"Want kind of surprise?" I question.

"I can't tell you, otherwise it wouldn't be a surprise," she says with a smile, "Changing topics real quick. Have your friends come by again?"

I tilt my head a little as I try to remember when they came by, I think it was five days ago, maybe three. Al, Aeri and Aereth paid me a visit not long ago. It was a great time; even if it came with some bad news I was still very glad to see them.

"No…but they gave me their emails and cellphone numbers!" I exclaim, "I've been talking to them through there, they are all going to be busy for New Year's Eve…"

"You will too," she says, "Your mother isn't answering…"

"Whatever could you mean by that dear auntie?" I ask and then immediately shrug, "Don't tell me we are going to my parents…"

She laughs and opens the small wardrobe in front of my bed. She takes out the clothes in which I was admitted into the hospital and throws them over my bed. I honestly don't even remember what I was wearing before going into SAO but she throws me checkered skirt and a rather plain white blouse along with some shoes and a pair of socks. She claps her hands together and smiles.

"These are all clean thanks to the staff, and I also brought you a coat, it's a bit cold outside."

"Thanks Auntie," I sing.

"Now, chop chop," she says, "I also would like to get the hell out of here, I need to clean the apartment."

Having been raised by a very traditional family I know exactly why she wants to go back and clean the apartment. New Year's Eve calls for a few little rituals, if you are really into the traditions you will clean your whole house and be eating noodles by eleven o'clock.

"Don't tell me you are doing Omisoka stuff again…" I sigh as I grab my blouse.

"Being your mother's sister rubs off alright? And it is New Year's Eve," she says, "Besides, I'm telling you, I have a surprise for you so I won't be bothering you stuff like that."

I have genuine curiosity as to what she means by a surprise. Maybe some of my friends are outside waiting for me. However, that is a thing I very much doubt though, given how most of my friends left me right after I dumped my boyfriend. I guess in the end they were more my boyfriend's friends than my own. It's a particular topic that I'm still mad about, but…I guess I am the bad person in that particular scenario.

I stand up next to my bed and feel my right knee buckle. I steady myself by grabbing unto the edge of the bed and sigh. My aunt is about to grab me, but as she sees me steady myself she backs away. I chuckle and undo my patient gown.

"My leg just went a bit numb, hehe," I say, "I can walk and stuff, you've seen me in therapy."

My aunt can only express worry with her pretty little eyes but I'm sure she understands. She nods and stands up straight; however she is focused on me. I'm sure even if I fake being a little unbalanced she will not hesitate to go to my aid.

I slip the blouse over myself and pat it down once I have it over me. Then I grab the skirt, lower it a little and step into it in order to pull it up my legs. Thankfully my laziness transcend into my choices in fashion so the skirt is one of those with the elastic bands that are easy to put on. I sit back on bed and grab my socks; I guess I was wearing a cute pair of them. They are a white, very thin and have a tiny pink boy around the ankle. Next up is shoes, I can handle shoes I think, I just hope they don't hurt to wear after a while. Black leather shoes with a tiny bit of heel. Yeah my feet are going to be killing me in a while.

"You know, I actually talked to the doctors and they told me you could've gotten out of here sooner if you tried to be a little less lazy when it came to your exercises," my aunt says.

"Some days I just didn't feel like it, I'm sorry…" I mumble as I slip my shoes on.

"How dare you lie to my face?" she snaps, "I know very well you only worked properly when you got that nurse to help you out."

I laugh almost immediately and scratch the back of my head.

"She was cute," I say sticking my tongue out.

She karate chops me over the head in a surprisingly gentle way and smiles.

"I know you too well."

Once dressed I grab the coat she got for me and also put it on as I feel a bit chilly. Being confined to a really cozy bed for over a month has spoiled me. The coat is pretty cozy itself so I really have no complaints.

"You look pretty for someone who stayed the past two years in a hospital," my aunt says.

"I've always been pretty," I wink at her.

She rolls her eyes and leaves the room with a sigh. It's fun to get that particular reaction from her. I remember doing so many times before SAO, she always laughs shortly after, that's when I know I did a good job. I approach the door of the room and hear her laugh loud enough for her to make a snorting sound in the process.

I pull the door and exit into the hallway, the simple fact of being out of my room with something else other than my gown makes it feel exhilarating. I finally get to go back home, I can finally start searching for Sumiko. My aunt has done all she can asking around and going to some of the nearby hospitals, but she hasn't had a lot of luck. Time for me to go around asking questions, maybe I will find her.

We make our way to the elevator and just as I press the button to head down a loud ringing sound indicates that the elevator is already here. It would some I'm burning on a little bit of luck here. We go inside after the doors open and press the button to the ground floor of the hospital. As the doors close the sound of random maracas and a xylophone intensifies itself. What is it with xylophones and why do they exists in elevator music?

I turn to my aunt and raises my right hand to my head, I scratch my head a little and I'm about to speak when she interrupts me.

"What is it?" she asks softly.

"You know…uh…I was thinking," I start.

"Do you feel ill or something?! Is something wrong?!" she asks as she holds back the urge to laugh.

I give her my best deadpan stare and cross my arms to oh so subtly express how I don't take kindly to her joke.

"Aww come on, you can't take a joke?"

"As I was trying to say…" I huff, "I know you got a surprise for me and stuff…but can I maybe skip it for today?"

"Alright, I'll let you off the hook if you give me one valid reason."

I have the most valid of them all dear Auntie.

"I have to find Sumiko," I say, "no…I don't have to, I need to Auntie. I need to know that she is safe, I need to see her beautiful face again, I need to hold her, I need to kiss her, I need her…"

As I put my feelings into words I can feel myself getting a bit teary, but even with a bit of tears in the very edge of my eyes I bite my lip in order to stop myself from crying. I wipe my eyes with the sleeves of my coat and stare my aunt right in the eye.

We arrive to the ground floor and she exits, still keeping eye contact with me. She crosses her arms and still keeps staring back. She smiles with the corner of her mouth and then places her right hand on my head.

"You can hate if you want for what I'm about to say, but I figured this girl you talked so much about could be something you easily forgot of," she says, "You do love her, don't you?"

I nod.

She slowly turns away from me and resume walking down the hallway. We come to a more open area with waiting chairs and a large desk like thing with a couple of nurses behind it. It's a bit odd to have spent a lot of time in a building, never realizing what the entrance even looked like.

"Alright, you have my permission to not enjoy my surprise for you," she says, "but you'll have to tell her you can't go with her today."

"Her?" I ask.

"Yeah, she is waiting right there, I'm sure you are familiar with her," my aunt says as she point to a figure by the door.

The figure shyly looks around the lobby area with a small box in one hand and a bouquet of roses on the other. The person seems to be pretty out of place wearing baggy pants and a hoodie, yet I approach her. She wears a hat that only let's a little of her blonde hair to be seen, as if sprouting out from the edges of her hat. I feel my heart thump loudly as I make out her lips, nose and eyes a bit clearly.

She turns to me and I see her eyes water as soon as we lock our sights on each other. She smiles from ear to ear and slowly approaches me.

"Is it really you?" she asks, as if she couldn't believe her own eyes.

I can't believe my own after all.

"Su…su…" I stutter as she keeps approaching me.

She raises both of her hands and shows me both the box she is holding along with the flowers.

"I didn't know what to bring you…so…so I," she stumbles with her words as she blushes and looks around, "I brought you chocolates and flowers."

She makes her way close to me until she is but a foot or so away from me. I take both the flowers and box of chocolates into my hands. I look at both of the presents and then go back to staring at her face. I'm still trying to say something, but my dumb words are not even coming out.

"Say something…" she says as she blushes an even deeper shade of red.

I drop the flowers and chocolate and grab her face. I pull it close to me and press my lips against hers, closing my eyes, dropping my hands to her neck to embrace her and pull her even closer. My hearts beats with such intensity that I feel like I might just break, but at the same time I feel a tender, pleasurable warmth spread all over my body from the very center of my being.

"There are people watching," she squeaks in a low voice as she tries to pull back.

I pay little to no attention to her words and kiss her again. I keep my lips pressed against hers until she relaxes her stiff arms and embraces me as well. I break away a mere inch from her lips and rest my forehead against hers.

I feel myself sob and hear my own breathing turn into sniffles.

"Don't cry," she says softly.

"I thought…I thought that something had happened to you, I couldn't find you…I…" I wail.

"It's ok, calm down, shh shh," she says softly as she holds me closer, "I'm here with you."

Her words make me cry even more and I just clutch at her like a baby. I cry loudly and without signs of stopping but I'm crying out of pure joy and relief. As I breathe in and out heavily closer to her chest I start noticing a bit of a funny smell. After it becomes too apparent to just ignore I back away a bit and use my arm's length to stay away from her.

"You smell funny," I say.

"This hoodie might have been on the floor of my room for a couple of days…" she admits.

"That's disgusting," I laugh as I wipe away my tears.

"So did you tell her you are not going already?" I hear my aunt ask.

"I'm going!" I yell back.

"That's what I thought," she teases, "Have fun, call me if you need anything."

I grab Sumiko's hand and pull her along with me to the exit of the hospital. I feel her squeeze my hand back and just keep walking until we make out to the street.

"Wait, wait," she pleads, "Can you be up and around like this? Are you going to be ok? Yo-you left the things I brought you!"

I'm sure my feet will be killing me in just an hour, I still feel a bit weak, but I couldn't care less.

"Who cares?" I say, "Let's go eat somewhere, there must be a restaurant or something around here! Oh I know! Is there a train station somewhere around here?"

I start going down the road with little to no idea where I'm even headed. There's always a train stop somewhere, you just have to keep heading somewhere and you'll eventually stumble into one.

"I care!" she says.

I laugh a little and stop right in front of a businessman who seems to be too preoccupied with his phone.

"Mister, mister," I call out.

"Hello…" he says, sounding confused.

"Where's the nearest train station?" I ask.

"Hamamatsucho station is down the road…" he says.

"Thank you very much!" I yell, "Have a good new year!"

I feel Sumiko still trying to get me to slow down, but I still manage to pull her along with me.

"At least pace yourself!" she begs.

"No!" I refuse with joy, "It's going to be like our first real date!"

"We've been together for a year," she replies.

"Who cares!" I say and giggle.

"I care!"

* * *

What should've been down the road turned out to be more than a couple of blocks down the road. My feet starting to hurt to the point I could no longer walk about halfway to the station and so Sumiko decided to carry me on her back as we made it into the station.

"How are you so damn strong?" I whisper next to her ear, being careful to do so as close as I'm able to in order to make her shiver.

She shakes a little as I intend her to and throws me up a bit to get a better grip on my legs.

"I did my physical therapy every single day to try and get out as soon as possible," she says as she walks into one of the train's car.

"Hmm, yeah, I kind of lazed around with that," I admit.

I hear her sigh but then she chuckles.

"Sounds like something you would do. Why are we going to Akihabara anyways?"

"It's because you gotta see where Esra….err Mio works!"

She drops me on an open seat and turns around very quickly.

"What do you mean?! You know where she is? Where are the others?!"

"They visited me a few days ago, I saw Aereth, Aeri, Esra and Al," I explain.

Her eyes brighten up and she sits right next to me, excited to hear more.

"What about Eli?! And Sinna?!"

We start getting a few weird looks in the train as we are being a little loud. It's a bit of an unspoken rule that any chatter while in trains you should keep at low volumes if not to yourself. Both Sumiko and I notice this and then laugh at each other.

"So, how did they find you?" she asks.

"Al is knee deep in something really messy, but it came with the perks of having a woman from the government to tell him where we all were," I explain, "They got to me first to ask me your real name and then they said they would try and find you with that. Speaking of which though…how did you find me?"

She adjusts her hat a little and then scratches the bridge of her nose as she tries to stray away from my eyes.

"I found you three days ago…" she says.

"What?!"

I turn my head as I make a lot of noise and again notice a few judging glances in my direction. I smile weakly at the strangers and then return to my conversation.

"Why didn't I see you then?" I ask.

"I found your aunt when I was screaming your name at the nurses in the lobby. Your hospital was like the fifth one I tried," she says, "I talked to her for a while, to be honest it felt like she was interrogating me…but anyways after a long while of just talking she told me you were going out in just a few days."

"So what?" I whine, "Why didn't you just barge into my room and threw yourself over me?"

"Because your aunt told me to wait and give you a surprise," she says, "Trust me I wanted to throw myself all o-"

She stops quickly and looks around the train again noticing again a few stares in our direction. She pulls down on her hat a little and clears her throat as she blushes.

"…over you…" she murmurs, "but I figured a surprised would be like so much better, and while I regret it a bit…it was worth it."

I lean in close to her and kiss her lips quickly and then take hold of her hand. Leaning back on my seat I can see that she is blushing a lot and trying to hide her face from the other train passengers. I notice a man staring over at me with a curious look on his face. This could be anyone really, but when people stare in this kind of situation it's just to amuse themselves or to later preach something about what they just witnessed.

"She is my girlfriend," I say with a smile.

"Congratulations," the man says sounding completely uninterested.

Then why were you staring?!

"Did you have to tell everyone here?" Sumiko asks with a quiet voice.

"Yeah, I'm going to scream it once more when we get down in Akihabara," I tease.

"So Esra works somewhere in Akihabara?" she asks, changing the topic.

"Yeah, she works at a maid café," I say as I swing my feet up and down.

"You are kidding…" she mumbles, "And she is working on New Year's Eve?"

"Dead serious," I answer, "I texted her while you were carrying me and she told me she has a shift until eight."

"I guess that stuck to her, huh?" she says.

"Speaking of things sticking," I huff, "Is that dumb hat glued to your head or something? And why are you wearing like smelly clothes and stuff…"

"I…I told you before this is what I'm normally like…" she says a bit embarrassed.

"You are normally smelly and look homeless?"

She flicks my forehead with her index finger and tells me to shut up. It hurts a little but it brings back so many good memories of when I used to tease her back in SAO.

"I just woke up late…and had to hurry…I couldn't shower…ok?"

"It's five in the afternoon."

"I…shut up, ok?" she whines.

It's a few minutes to Akihabara station, but it gives me more than enough to time to get her up to speed in what I learned from when Al and everyone else visited me. Eli has amnesia and her sister refuses to let anyone see her right now. However, Mirai a.k.a. Aeri has been talking to her through emails and calls and what not, although…Al doesn't know that. I wish I could've talked more to Miria, but they left in such a hurry. Haruhiko a.k.a. Aereth is still trying to find Sinna, but they just can't seem to locate her just yet.

We arrive to Akihabara and I ask Sumiko to carry me again as my feet are really not working in my favor right now. If the direction Mio sent me is right, the café shouldn't be that far away from station itself. Actually it should be just a few establishments to the left after exiting the station.

Sumiko puts me down once we are in a small elevator and she presses the button to the café's floor. She sighs and grabs her head with her left hand.

"Amnesia…that's some fucking stuff…" she elegantly puts it, "I'm sure Aeri is trying her best to get her to remember something though…"

"Mirai," I correct her.

"Right, right…sorry it's just confusing to know their real names now," she mumbles, "Esra's is Mio, right?"

The elevator stops and the doors open to two pretty girls in maid costumes. They look at us for a brief second and then with big smiles approach us.

"Welcome home, master," the one on the right says.

"Welcome home, mistress," the one on the left says.

"I'm…I'm not a guy…" Sumiko grumbles.

The maid on the right side lights up in embarrassment and bows around seven times in Sumiko's direction as she begs for forgiveness.

"I'm truly sorry about that," the other maid says, "Is this your first time visiting us?"

"Yeah, hehe," I laugh as I try not to stare too much, "We know someone that works here though."

I feel Sumiko slap the back of my head as my eyes deviate from the maid.

"You actually get kicked out of these places for being a perv," she warns me.

I can't help it if these kind of establishments only hire cute girls and on top of that put them in such short, frilly skirts. I nod with a sorry smile and get back to the maid.

"Oh!" she gasps, "Would you like to request a maid in particular then?"

"Her name is Mio…" Sumiko says.

The maid smiles and goes behind a small counter right next to the door leading inside the café. She seems to be busy looking up something on the computer behind the counter. She then beckons the other maid over and together they start looking at stuff in their screen.

"Is Mio her maid name?" they ask.

"Maid name?" Sumiko asks.

"Well to protect the identity of our maids, they all choose their maid names for them to work here," they explain.

"You don't think…" Sumiko says.

"What about…Esra?" I ask.

The maid that mistakenly took my girlfriend for a man suddenly starts tapping on her coworker's shoulder.

"The new girl, the new girl!" she repeats.

"Ah, right!" the other maid says.

They both come out from behind the counter and open the door to the café.

"Right this way!" They both say in unison, "We'll tell Esra she has special visitors! Please take a seat wherever you like!"

Inside the café there's a few other men being catered to by more pretty girls in cute uniforms. A bit of a sad sight if you consider they all seem to be alone and in different tables…and it is New Year's Eve.

Sumiko sits down in a small booth close to the establishment's door and slides down to sit just next to the wall. I sit down opposite of her and look around, waiting for Mio to come by.

"Geez…I can't believe she even kept the name," Sumiko says, "Why would she cling to that? I mean I haven't even touched video games ever since I went back home. It's just weird."

I sense a bit of criticism in her comment and while I try my best to just brush it off I feel the need to speak up.

"Hey, everyone copes differently alright?" I say a bit harshly.

"I didn't mean anything by it…" she mumbles, "I must've sound like an asshole."

"You did," I pout.

"Sorry…"

"Welcome to- Ran!" A voice on my left sounds off.

"Mio!" I say as I notice her.

I jump up from my seat to hug her, but she quickly pushes me back into my seat. She looks over her shoulder and I tilt my head to see another maid shaking her head in Mio's direction.

"Costumers can't touch," Mio says softly.

"What the hell kind of rule is that?" I whine.

"Anyway," she says and clears her throat, "Welcome to Happy Maid! Here are your menus! How may I be of service?"

The way she talks suddenly sounds like out of a cartoon. She is trying to sound overly cute as she strikes different poses with each sentence. I want to laugh a bit, but I might just be enjoying the short length of her skirt a little too much.

"I thought you were coming over with Sumiko," Mio says quietly.

"Hi," Sumiko says sounding very unnerved.

"Ooooohh!" Mio exclaims in surprise and again looks over her shoulder, she turns her head around again and points at my shoes, "EHHHMMM GEEE, your shoes are so pretty, mistress!"

"Nice save," Sumiko huffs.

"I was half expecting you to be wearing a really fancy outfit or dress…." Mio answer softly.

"I was half expecting you to open the door for me," Sumiko fires back.

"Hey now, let's all relax…" I laugh.

Mio's eyes are glassy as she stares at Sumiko, and I can almost hear her grip tightening around the metal tray she is holding with both hands in front of her.

"I'm sorry about that…" Sumiko apologizes.

"It's not that…I'm just really happy to see you," Mio answers with smile, "I just want to hug you or something…but I'm still on my shift."

"I'll hug you later, all you want," Sumiko replies.

Time flies by as we order a lot of food and get a hold of Mio every few minutes to quietly chat about a few things. I get Mio to draw hearts with ketchup on my food and to make a bunny with the foam of my coffee and overall just have a blast staring at all the cute girls.

The clock steadily ticks to eight o clock and Mio disappears for a bit to get back into regular clothes. The little time I got to see her out of a maid outfit in SAO it was always something classy, like nice looking sweaters or dresses. To see her in jeans for change just clashes horribly with the image I had built up of her.

"So, did Haruhiko tell you?" Mio asks as we exit the elevator.

We step into the now a bit colder streets of Akihabara and wait for Sumiko to exit the building.

"Huh?" I ponder, "bout what?"

"He found Sinna," she mutters.

"What?! That's amazing!" I reply.

"And where is she?" Sumiko asks as she stuffs a cookie in her mouth.

"In an orphanage…" Mio says, "Her father isn't around and…uh, the mother committed suicide while she was in the game."

I feel my stomach churn a little and I brace myself.

"Crap…" Sumiko mumbles.

Mio just nods and wraps a red scarf around her neck. She rubs her hands together and then blows into to them to warm up.

"You two have any plans for New Year's?" Mio asks in a very obvious attempt to change topics.

"I don't know really…" I answer.

"Maybe we'll walk around some more before going home," Sumiko says.

"Whose?" I ask while leaning a little over her.

Mio laughs loudly for a few seconds and then hugs both me and Sumiko with a lot of strength.

"It makes me so glad to see you two haven't changed," she says.

"I'm glad to hear you say that," Sumiko says.

Mio stops hugging us and then looks at us with glassy eyes again, but she smiles.

"You two have a good New Year," she says, fuzziness just emanating out of her tone.

"You too," I answer.

"We'll see you soon," Sumiko adds.

We watch Mio walk down to Akihabara's train station and watch her disappear as she goes inside. I turn around to look at Sumiko and catch her staring at me with loving eyes. I wink at her making her blush a little as she realizes I caught her staring. I reach out to her and get my hands on her damn hat.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

"I just want to see you without that stupid hat," I say.

I'm able to pull it off and keep my eyes on her as her long blonde hair cascades down to her shoulders, stopping just a bit past them. I run my fingers down from the side of her head to her shoulder, feeling her soft hair.

"Why do you dress like a guy trying to buy porn in a crowded convenience store?" I ask.

"It's just tha- that is an awfully specific example," she points out.

"They are easy to spot," I shrug.

"That aside…I'm just not used to going out…like at all," she admits, "I didn't have anything cute to wear and…I just opted for something comfortable, sorry…"

"I'm just teasing you," I say, "It's just that you are so damn pretty to let it all go to waste."

She blushes again and takes her hat away from my hands. Instead of putting it back on she hesitates and walks to a nearby trashcan. I walk along with her and watch her hold out her hat in front of her.

"Maybe I can start the New Year on a clean slate, maybe buy some cute clothes and stuff like that…" she says.

"Sounds like fun," I giggle.

"Besides, I expect to…" she stops, turns to me with red cheeks and then looks away, "I expect you to take me out many more times in the future."

I blush a bit myself as her words catch me a little off-guard. I hug her from behind and rest my forehead against her back. All this talk about starting the New Year with a clean slate suddenly has me thinking about something I'm yet to come clean about. I hear her throw her hat into the trash and hug her a bit tighter.

She places her hands over my own and rubs them gently. She tries to start walking but I stop her by not letting go of her.

"Come on, don't be silly," she laughs.

"Can I start with a clean slate too?" I ask.

"Huh?"

"There's…something I never told you," I mutter.

With my arms still around her I feel her breathe in and after a few seconds breathe out. Then what feels like a drop of water slides down my hand. I look up to the sky and see several thin snowflakes floating about. It normally snows around February. Sumiko looks up as well and lifts her hand to catch a couple of the flakes.

"What is it?" she asks.

I rest my head against her back once more and breathe in deeply.

"I…I had a boyfriend I never broke up with before meeting you…" I admit.

She sets her hands back on my own and forces her way to hold them tightly.

"Does your heart still skip a beat whenever you see me or talk to me?" she asks.

"Of course it does…" I murmur as I squeeze her hands.

I feel her squeeze back and feel as a huge burden is lifted from my shoulders.

"A clean slate won't do though," she says.

Shoe doesn't say anything after that, she just stops. I feel my heart drop and my stomach betrays me as I just feel a horrible spreading sensation all over my tummy. Sumiko turns around with a smile.

"I expect you to spoil me a whole lot too," she says with a laugh.

"You asshole!" I cry as I hit her arm, "Don't say things like that and do dumb dramatic pauses!"

She grabs my arm as I try to hit her arm again and pulls me close to her.

"I love you, Ran."

One last tiny tear escapes my eye and I get a bit closer.

"I love you too."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Oh man, I felt all kinds of fuzzy when writing this chapter. It's the first truly sweet and peaceful chapter I think I've written for this story. No overtaking drama or sadness just fuzzy fuzzy love from out fan favorite girl! I'm officially announcing that there is a grand total of two more chapters to my story! Also I know I've done the following probably a lot of times by now, but after next week's chapter I would like to take a week's break to for this time really revise all of my chapters for dumb little mistakes and craft an amazing last chapter! I just want to post my last chapter with the whole story being on it's best possible condition.

**OneTiredSloth: **My Sloth friend I hope this chapter satiates your need for things to get a little better. Soon I will no longer be able to torture our lovely characters. **IC0: **I did read it, but never got around to watching it sadly. I SHALL ADD IT TO MY TO WATCH LIST! Lynn is fun and scary hehe. **jtgamer-aza: **I had to do something to that bastard Klaus but I was not going to delve in the edgy pool of angst like on the anime where they try to kill each other IRL CAUSE REASONS. **Electornic Ink 0: **I guess I need apologize for the latter part of your review. I know I never explicitly said it, but I guess I also did a horrible job at conveying the following. Well let's consider quickly that despite being in the process or dying or not the players in SAO were not all disconnected at the same time. (We can see Kayaba still logging people out as he leisurely talks to both Kirito and Asuna after all.) Also I believe I wrote this in, and I'm extremely sorry if I didn't, but Elina was in a different Hospital before being transferred to the Neurological Hospital. So I guess my ideal scenario would've been that I conveyed all these things properly and given your review I guess I didn't so apologize for that and for having to explain something that should've been in my story right now, I'm truly sorry. I hope this chapter dragged you out of the depressing vibes of the others I know it did for me. Thank you so much for your support!

That is all for this week! I'm so happy and sad to be drawing this close to the end. I cried while writing this chapter because of what it meant for my story, being the thrid to last chapter. BUT ENOUGH OF ME AND MY FEELINGS! I will see you all next week!

Next Chapter: "Unbroken Promises"


	83. Chapter 83 - Unbroken Promises

**Chapter 83 – Unbroken Promises**

**February/22****nd****/2025**

**Akagi Apartment - Tokyo**

**Yuuji**

"I don't know what you had that lady do, but I can't thank you enough."

"I know you'll take care of her, besides, she needs someone right now," I say into the phone, "I couldn't think of a better person. Besides…it really helped that you are legally an adult."

I adjust my grip on my phone and sit down on the edge of my bed. If I actually told him how much it took me to convince Lynn of working her magic he would be doing a whole lot more than just thanking me through the phone.

"I'll do my best, I'll do my best for you…for her."

"I know you will buddy," I say firmly, "You take care, talk to you later."

I move the phone away from my ear and stare at it for a few seconds. The caller id shows Haruhiko's full name along with a picture of him. I'm about to press the button to hang up when I hear him shout.

"Wait! Hang on a second!"

I return the phone to its original position next to my ear and clear my throat with a soft chuckle.

"Yeah?"

"I promised Nao I would take her to the beach…wanna come?" he asks, "I already invited the others. Mio, Ran, Sumiko and Mirai already said yes, I have a house down there."

"When?" I ask.

"Next week?"

"Isn't February a terrible time to go to the beach?"

"It really isn't that cold, I can guarantee it will be hotter than the city," he explains.

"Ehm…" I start, "Did you invite Akari?"

"Yes…" he says, "is that a problem? I haven't heard back from her though."

To tell him that there is no problem in that would just mean me lying to his face. While sadly I'm no stranger to that, to do so now, just feels wrong. Yet…

"Nah, I'll go, just send me the fine details later, ok?" I say.

"Sure thing man, talk to you later then."

"Yeah, take care…"

I bring my phone down once more and this time press the button to hang up before Haruhiko decides to say something else. I hear my phone beep as I hang up and then I close it. Say what you will about flip phones, they are the greatest thing I've ever known; I just can't get accustomed to touchscreen phones. I place my phone over my desk and lay down on my bed.

It's been two months and I still don't know how to feel about the whole deal. A huge part of me is angry beyond reason. I want to go and meet Akari somewhere and tell her every little, single detail about my time with her to make her remember. However, there's a small part of me that is glad that she doesn't remember. Our time in SAO despite it having good moments was anything but pleasant. Despite our love…despite our friends, I truly think it's a time that is best forgotten.

I cover my eyes with my right hand and breathe in deeply. I take my sweet time before exhaling, thinking about stuff. I press my fingers against my face and then slide my hand down, finally exhaling.

Even if she goes I guess I can try to have a good time, everyone else will be there after all. It's been ages since I last went to the beach too, maybe it'll be good. If I just can't handle it I think I can leave early or downright ignore her…

My cellphone starts ringing; I never bothered to change the damn ringtone so I have to listen to the cellphone's company jingle sound off loudly. I sit up slowly and reach over to my desk to grab the cellphone. I open it and see the caller's id.

**-Amori Lynn-**

Right, I did agree to one last meeting after all the questioning was done. It would seem Lynn wants something else from other than just retellings of what happened in SAO. I place my thumb over the green button on my phone and hesitate for a moment. Dealing with Lynn requires a lot of patience, not to mention the way she talks is downright weird. She is a weird mixture between formal and informal.

I press the button and slowly bring the phone up to my ear.

"Mr. Akagi? How are you doing this fine afternoon?"

"Good, how are you?" I ask.

"I'm doing just fine, thanks for asking," she says, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but…"

"You probably aren't…" I breathe.

"Excuse me?"

"Nothing…nothing."

"I see, well, as I was about to say…" she mutters, "We agreed to have one last meeting today."

She likes to reiterate things, over the months I have getting used to it, but I still feel like it's a bit unnecessary.

"That we did," I answer.

"Are you free right now, Mr. Akagi?"

"I am…where do you want to meet?"

I hear my phones beep as the call drops and I take the phone away from my ear to see that the call has all together stopped. I try dialing her, but it immediately goes to voice mail. I'm about to dial once more when I hear a knock on the door to my apartment.

I leave my phone over my desk as I stand up and stretch my arms out to the ceiling once I'm up on my two feet.

"Coming!" I yell.

Step by step I exit my room and make it to the small living room area in my apartment. By no means do I live somewhere luxurious. The apartment consists of two bedrooms, one bathroom, a kitchen, a small living room and the small hallway leading inside from the door.

I notice the place seems to be a bit dark, the curtains are shut. They have probably been like that for a few days, my father had to leave once again for work a few days ago and I've been meeting up with Mio and Haruhiko to distract myself, I don't enjoy spending time at home anymore. If I can't manage to plan something with them I just go out for walks until it's really late at night. I've been finding it easier to sleep when I'm exhausted.

I walk over to the curtains and draw them open, flooding the room with a bit of light from the sun. It's definitely a welcome change, but it also highlights that both the small table on the living room and the couches have not been cleaned in a while.

Someone knocks on the doors again.

"Coming!" I yell, "Geez…"

Well, I didn't order any food, nor told anyone to meet me at my home. It could probably be Mio though, I remember inviting her over to my house the last time I saw her. Although, I'm pretty sure the date we agreed upon was not today…

I reach the door and peek out the peephole. To my surprise I see Lynn and her co-worker Kikouka standing next to her. She is wearing her sunglasses and has her arms crossed as Kikouka slowly scans around the hallway. He holds a briefcase on his right hand and shifts a little in his stance. I sigh and open the door.

"You could have just said that you were outside," I complain.

"There's no fun in doing that, Mr. Akagi," she says with a smile.

"I never thought you would be the kind of person to be fun," I answer.

Kikouka chortles but quickly clears his throat to erase any remote trace of laughter. He then coughs a few times and nods his head in my direction.

"Yuuji, so good to see you again," he says.

"Kikouka, I did not know we were already in a first name basis, given how I have only talked to you twice, this being the second," I huff.

This time Lynn chortles for a second and then turns to her coworker, lowering her shades in the process.

"Mr. Akagi then…" Kikouka corrects himself.

"Come in, please," I say as I step aside.

Lynn pockets her sunglasses and lets her hair down from her ponytail. Part of me wants to laugh at the fact that she feels just right at home and the other is kind of relieved that she feels welcome in my own apartment. Kikouka on the other hand walks in cautiously, however that might be attributed to the fact that I borderline insulted him at my doorstep.

"I certainly hope I'm not the first to let you know, but I'm glad to inform you that the guardianship of Morita Nao has been assigned to one Okui Haruhiko," she says, "It took a little more than expected, but trust me the months of paperwork were worth seeing a smile on that poor little girl's face."

"Haruhiko called me not long ago, he said we had picked her up already," I say with a smile, "Thank you, Lynn."

She smiles as I close the door behind Kikouka. Quickly I make my way past both of them. As I walk next to Lynn I see her take off her shoes, to which Kikouka quickly follows.

"This place is a bit of a mess," I announce, "I haven't been spending too much time indoors, so give me a second."

I quickly locate a damp cloth resting over the faucet of the sink in the kitchen and grab it. With quick steps I go into the living room and wipe the small coffee table clean and do what I can with the couches. It's not completely dust free, but I believe it's the best I can do in the few seconds it takes both of the investigators to reach the living room.

"Not to worry, Mr. Akagi," Lynn says, "I bring some news I'm sure you will be glad to hear, but I would like to address one final thing before that."

I raise an eyebrow and shoot Lynn a grin.

"It's not like you have ever given me the news before the questions."

"I believe you are right," she says, "I think it's only fair though, that way I can see that both of us are happy in our exchanges."

"Yeah, yeah," I mumble, "You guys want anything to drink? I think I have….well water and maybe some beers on the fridge."

I know it's barely two in the afternoon, but water and whatever left over beer from my dad I have in the fridge is really all I have to offer.

"I thought you were still under twenty?" Kikouka questions.

"Water or beer?" I ask again, this time sounding a bit irked.

"Uh…water is alright…" he replies.

I start making my way back to the kitchen as Lynn takes a seat. She lets herself drop over the couch and sighs as she stretches her legs. That woman is really something.

"What about you, Lynn?" I ask.

"Water is just fine, Mr. Akagi," she says.

I finally turn my attention to getting two glasses of water ready for my visitors and hear Kikouka finally sitting down on the couch. From the talks I've had with Lynn I have come to find out that Kikouka is actually Lynn's higher upper, but this does not stop Lynn from having her occasional jab at him. It doesn't help either that Kikouka is a really tame person when it comes to dealing with people he doesn't know, hence why I can be rude to him and have him not lash out in the slightest. Although even a calm person can snap and given the fact that I don't really know him it should be wise not to push him too much.

I fetch two glasses from one of the cupboards and fill them with water. With a deep breath I turn around head to the living room. As I sit down I set both glasses over the table and notice a rather fat folder on top of the recently cleaned table. The word "Confidential" stamped across it just like a cheesy spy movie.

"Here you go…" I mutter as my eyes linger on the folder.

"I see you have noticed what we are here to talk about," Kikouka says.

More questions I suppose, whatever that fat folder contains is probably related to the SAO incident. Perhaps it's that database Lynn mentioned, a full compendium of the important players the ministry wants to keep tabs on in the future. I cannot comprehend why she wouldn't put the damn thing into a flash drive, but I guess physical files are harder to steal than digital ones.

"And what might that be?" I ask.

"You see, Mr. Akagi," Lynn starts, "There is just so much more to our investigation other than the victims and persons of interest regarding the SAO incident."

"Huh?" I exclaim, "What else are you guys even doing?"

"Before any of that…" Kikouka mutters as he takes out what looks like a contract out of his briefcase, "We would like you to sign this non-disclosure agreement."

The man lays out the several pages of paper in front of me and leans back on the couch.

"I know literally nothing about NDA's," I huff, "What the hell is in the fine print?"

"I assure you this contract strictly covers the fact that you will not be allowed to talk about our next conversation to anyone…ever," Kikouka explains.

What the hell kind of explanation is that? Ever since I first saw this man I knew something was up with him. The fact that he just comes to my house after just talking to me once with a non-disclosure agreement of all things just fires up all kinds of red flags in my head.

"What if I don't want to have part in our next conversation?" I ask.

"Then we will leave, and sadly I will have to order Ms. Amori here to withhold any kind of information she intended to share with you today."

What a bastard.

I turn my gaze to Lynn and see her nod.

"I assure you the contract only forbids you from talking to anyone about an offer we have for you," Lynn says, "There is nothing in the fine print, after this conversation, if you choose to refuse our offer we will be out of your life, and I will be sure to give you the last bit of news we have for you."

"Really?" I ask, "You'll tell me regardless of my answer to your offer?"

Lynn nods.

I have no reason to trust Kikouka, however Lynn has proven time and time again that she is trustworthy. Not to mention she has gone above and beyond the call of duty to fulfill both her promises to me and my selfish requests. I stare at her for a few seconds and ultimately let my gut determine that what she says is true. After all, I really do want to hear what the last bit of news she has for me is.

I agree with Kikouka and let him guide me through the tedious process of signing the contract. I write my name here, my initials there, etc. What feels like more than few minutes goes by and I'm finally done signing the damn thing.

"Alright then," Kikouka says, "Everything we say from now on will be tied to this agreement, unless we state otherwise."

I nod and lean back on the coach as I watch both Lynn and Kikouka sit up to address me in a more formal manner.

"Ms. Amori and I work for the Japanese government's Self-Defense Force," he states, "We rank Mayor and Lieutenant Colonel respectively."

"Wait, what?" I ask, confused.

As I ask my question both of them set card IDs over the table which list their names, ranks, subsequent clearance and pay grade. Confused I grab both of the IDs and thoroughly scan them, not really believing my eyes or ears for that matter. After reading and re-reading the small IDs several times I set them back over the table.

"We are here to offer you a chance to serve your country in the development of a Bottom-up AI," he says.

Lynn leans forwards and hands me the folder she had placed on the table. As I grab it I feel the sheer weight of the thing almost making me drop it in the process. I take hold of it with both of my hands and open it to a page the simple reads "Project Alicization". I turn the page to a bunch of technical mumbo jumbo that I cannot even begin to understand.

Artificial Labile Inteligent Cybernated Existance.

The project intends to create the world's first Highly Adaptive Bottom-up AI.

I stop as I seriously do not understand what I'm even reading and also because over half of the damn page happens to be redacted with black marker.

"What the hell is this?" I ask.

"This, Mr. Akagi is the JSDF's attempt to strengthen its defense technology to surpass its enemies in future armed conflicts," Lynn explains.

"You seriously need to simplify this for me…" I mutter as I keep flipping through the pages.

A couple of things keep popping up through the pages. A corporation with the name of "Rath", a device or machine called "Soul Translator" currently being fully developed by an individual named "Higa Takeru" and lastly the word "Fluctlight" scattered all across the documents. More importantly whatever I can read and understand about the whole thing states that the project is still on its early stages, however, they wish to start testing on mature human subjects. I feel my stomach turn a little as I can only come to the conclusion that a phrase like that can only mean that they have tested on not mature subjects.

"What this project needs is subjects used to living in a virtual environment, subjects that have shown prowess and skill at living in said environment," Lynn says, "Alicization is still in early stages of its development, but we think that the sooner we start using subjects that meet this criteria the sooner we can yield results."

"Basically, Mr. Akagi," Kikouka says, "We would want you to consider the idea of volunteering for this project…which would mean spending prolonged periods of time in a safer, more advanced version of a full dive machine."

Immediately after hearing this I close the folder to Project Alicization and drop it over the table between me and both of so called investigators.

"What in the world makes you think I would ever want to touch another full dive machine?" I grunt.

"Well, we do have a sizable monetary compensation on a monthly basis," Lynn explains as she drops a check in front of me.

I merely adjust my position to look at the thing and stop reading the amount of money they are willing to pay me for this after the seventh digit.

"I refuse," I huff.

"I see, well, I guess that's tha-"

"Please, Mr. Akagi, we urge you to reconsider," Kikouka says, interrupting Lynn, "If the data we have collected about you is to be trusted you are a prime candidate for this project. Sadly we only have a couple other subjects that would meet the criteria like you."

"Who?"

"Well for starters, your friend Mirai," Kikouka spits.

I feel my hair standing on end and bare my teeth to the lieutenant colonel.

"You stay the hell away from her," I seethe.

"That was unnecessary," Lynn says in Kikouka's direction, "Ms. Kanada already refused our offer."

These bastards…what the hell is up with this shady bullshit?

Kikouka's demeanor quickly changes from meek to imposing in the matter of seconds and he now stares at me with narrow eyes as if expecting something out of me. As if he knew my every single in and out.

"Tell me, Yuuji…don't you miss it?" Kikouka asks.

"Miss what?" I snap back.

"The power you used to have in SAO, didn't that feel great?"

"Kikouka…" Lynn mumbles.

"Don't you miss being stronger? Faster? Better?" he drones on, "Tell me, is your life right now any better than it was in there? You go out and meet with your friends, keep yourself busy and waste time so you don't have to come back to this empty apartment."

"You've been follo-"

"Yes," he interrupts, "I thought Lynn made it clear we would be keeping an eye on you. Now please let me finish. What do you even have going on here Yuuji? Your girlfriend doesn't remember you, your friends only remind you of your mistakes, you are but a shell of the person you were inside SAO. Where is that fearless man I've heard about in Lynn's reports? Where is that man who was willing to kill to make things better for himself?!"

I clench my teeth and look away from Kikouka as I turn my hands into fists.

"Kikouka stop it!" Lynn says as she stands up.

He shoots Lynn a raging glare and stands up next to her. He reaches inside the pockets of his suit jacket and takes out a card. He throws it over the table and scoffs in Lynn's direction.

"Call me if you ever change your mind," he says and removes himself from the living room.

I hear the door to my apartment being shut and slowly try to relax my body.

"What the fuck was that, Lynn?" I ask softly.

"I'm…sorry, I truly am," she says and kneels right in front of me, "All of that was uncalled for…I only wished to make the offer…once you declined I planned on dropping the subject."

I find myself lost in Kikouka's words, he's right…he truly is. What the hell am I even doing with my life at this point? I have not gone back to school, I have not tried getting a job, I'm just…drifting. I don't miss my time in SAO…but I truly was something else in there.

"Hey, I still got some news, if you want them…" Lynn mutters, "I…I found your friend Daath."

"You mean you found a grave…" I groan.

"Yes, but…I thought…" she says, "I thought you would like to visit him…"

For some reason I expected Lynn to find the dead sooner than the living, however it took her longer to find graves than it did actual people. Daath is the last person I needed her to find for me, it would seem my time with Lynn has finally come to an end.

"You said you would be out of my life, right?" I ask.

"I did say that," she quickly replies, "I intend to keep my word…Mr. Akagi."

I chuckle as I hear my name coming out of her mouth.

"I'm going to need a ride."

* * *

**Aoyama Cemetery – Tokyo**

I zip up my jacket and push my hands into my pockets as I walk through graves. I guess it's only appropriate for a cemetery to be chilly. Any place even remotely as somber as a cemetery deserves to be cold I guess.

"It should be up ahead," Lynn says as she stops behind me, "Do you want me to tell you his real name again?"

"I…got it the first time; I just gotta look for the family name…should be easy," I mutter, "Yanagi…right?"

"Do you want me to come with you?" she asks.

I shake my head.

"I'll be alright," I answer.

My legs are shaking, but it's not because it's cold. I think I've grown into a bit of a habit of talking to dead people as of late with me visiting the graves of Siren, Kato, Regi, Owl and the others but this one grave…it means so much more. All of the others are part of the reason why I'm alive to begin with, but Daath…he just means so much more.

"I think this is where we part ways then," Lynn says, almost sounding sad.

"Alright, I would say it's been a pleasure…" I mumble, "but I can't honestly say I enjoyed most of it."

She laughs a little and puts on her sunglasses.

"I did enjoy our talks even if it's hard for you to believe," she says and extends her hand in my direction, "It's been a pleasure…Yuuji."

I reach out for her hand and give it a good, firm shake.

"Take care, Ms. Amori," I smile.

"You too," she says and turns around to retrace our steps out of the cemetery.

Yanagi Kotaro, that was his name. That's the name of the man who saved my life.

I keep walking through tombstones as I keep an out for his family name. It takes me a few steps from where Lynn left me to find something however it's not what I expect. I find a tombstone with the family name I'm looking for however it's not Kotaro's.

**-Yanagi Mako-**

**-2009 – 2024-**

**-Beloved Daughter &amp; Sister-**

Daath had a sister. He did mention her probably just a handful of time, he didn't like discussing real world stuff anyways. I guess that just how he was. She was not in SAO that's for sure, but it's kind of cruel to see that the year of her death is only a year separated from that of her brother.

The poor girl was only fifteen years old. God knows what the reason of her death was. This is all just…shitty. I feel as my own spit gets hard to swallow and decide to close my eyes for a few seconds.

I breathe in slowly as I can only figure Kotaro's tombstone is just next to this one. I walk two steps to the right and surely enough find it. I bend a knee and place my hand over the stone, and slowly trace my fingers over the top of it.

"Did I let you down?" I ask to the air.

I hear nothing but the distant sounds of cars running and the wind surging through the place. I sigh and chuckle to myself.

"I probably did, huh?" I continue, "I couldn't get everyone back…bu…but I tried my hardest, I swear...I swear I did."

I feel tears welling up on the corners of my eyes and then let out a sob as I breathe out.

"Enough of this shit though…" I grunt as I bite my own lip and stand back up, "I'm done crying, I'm done…I'm so done."

My hand still lingers on top of the stone. My damn phone starts to ring and I stick my hand into my pocket. As I take out my phone as see small card fall from the pocket. That's right, I did take Kikouka's card. I answer the call and put the phone to my ear as I kneel down to pick up the card.

"Yuuji!" Haruhiko yells, "Everyone is coming to the beach!"

"Akari already got back to you, huh?" I ask.

"Yup!" he says with excitement, "You should really come…it'll be fun man."

I turn Kikouka's card over and see his phone number and information neatly printed into the card. I breathe in as I pocket it and sigh.

"Yeah, I'll go," I answer, "It should be fun."

"I'll send you an email with the bus schedules and how to get there," he explains, "Man, I can't wait, everything is just falling into place."

I smile, it's good to hear that at the very least someone is not having a bad time dealing with all of this.

"Yeah, thanks," I say, "See you then."

I hang up on Haruhiko and put my phone back in my pocket. I stare and read what's written in the damn slab of stone over and over. Just like back in Aincrad I try my best to convince myself that this is just a bad dream, but it's real. It's just as real as it was in that virtual world.

At the very least I managed to keep that one promise.

I wipe the tears off of my eyes and slowly place my hand on top of the tombstone again.

**-Yanagi Kotaro-**

**-2006 – 2023-**

**-Beloved Son &amp; Brother-**

"Thank you, Daath…I made it back."

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

One chapter left in this story...it's really messing with me. I spent most of my time yesterday thinking about what I would write next, wondering if it would be good. Wondering if it would be nearly as successful as this story. (Which in reality isn't even that big...I mean yeah I am the longest story still being updated in this section...lol I've checked) but I'm nowhere near the reviews, favorites or followers of something like "Partners". I know the reason to this though and it's because I do not have Kirito and Asuna as my main characters thus alienating half of the people that come to this section of this site looking for a story to read. Either way though, I will be using this coming week to hard hard in leaving the past chapters of this fic in tip top shape. So I will be updating past chapters as the week goes by. So that means no chapter next Sunday and the final chapter of this story will be posted on August/7th/2016. (P.S. I seriously hope the bit about Project Alicization was just straight up porn to anyone very familiar with that arc.)

**IC0: **I had the chance to go to a maid cafe with a couple of friends two years ago in a trap to Japan. They are certainly something I would say anyone has to experience at least once in their life but it was a bit weird. They all had extremely high pitched voices and I kid you not did strike poses with every sentence they uttered. Not something I would do again with excitement but it was definitely...something. If you ever do start making videos be sure to send me a link haha. Also yeah poor Sinna, muahaha. **OneTiredSloth: **I do want to keep writing stories, will most definitely write another fic in the future, however I'm still unsure about which universe I will take into my hands next. I've been thinking a lot about an idea for Re:Zero and maybe Attack on Titan, but I really don't know. Be sure to keep me in your alerts, I'm sure I will come back in the future, hopefully to once again trap you with a story of mine. **Electronic Ink 0: **Thank you so much for this review, trust me I understand and adore every thing you said in this small paragraph. Lately media has only been pandering to the LGBT demographics by ramming characters into things and suddenly making them gay or something or other just because of wow LOOK LOOK THEY ARE GAY WE ARE SO PROGRESSIVE. Completely missing the point in making a character and basically just making the fact that they are gay their personality. And no, thank YOU for being so awesome. **SkySlash9: **Thank you so much it's so cool to see you again!

Well that's it for this week, I will now start working on fixing little mistakes across my chapters. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING MY STORY! I love each and everyone of you that read this, you are literally the reason I keep writing. Just one chapter left. As always. If you like what you read please leave a review! I will see you all in two weeks!


	84. Chapter 84 - New Game Plus

**Chapter 84 – New Game +**

**February/28th/2025**

**Nanjo - Okinawa**

**Yuuji**

"You can still back out, Mr. Akagi," she insists, "This doesn't need to happen; it doesn't have to be you. The Alicization Project can move on even without your participation."

"I already spoke with Kikouka. He told me you would pick me up. You know where I am right?" I ask her, ignoring her previous pleas.

"He gave me the address of a house in Nanjo…" she mutters, "Mr. Akagi, please think about it, it's not too late. I can just say you didn't come to meet me."

I remain silent and step down from the bus I just spent the last hour in. In front of me is a rundown bus stop that overlooks a small bay. There's only a small bench right next to the bus sign with a small shadow cast over it thanks to an incomplete roof which barely stands over the bench.

"Mr. Akagi?"

"Yeah?"

I walk a few steps towards the bench and drop my duffle bag on the ground. I sit down and sigh into the phone.

"Please…" she says, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't really want to do this. I can tell from the last time we talked. I can tell right now…"

"Let me correct you then."

I half expect her to insist once again, to tell me to back out, but she doesn't. She chooses to stay silent; perhaps she is trying to choose the right words. Maybe she is trying to come up with the perfect sentence to dissuade me from going.

Maybe, just maybe.

"Just be here at night. I'll see you outside the house."

Not allowing her to speak once more I hang up on her and turn my phone off. I stand up and throw it up and down in my hand. I go around the bus stop and take a good long look at the bay. It's beautiful; the sun shines brightly off the waves as they move close to the sand. I catch my phone one last time and pull my arm back.

Skipping ahead I throw my upper body forwards and let my phone go. I see it fly in an almost straight line into the trees that are but a few feet away from the sand. I don't even hear it land anywhere; it's too far away for me to even tell where it falls.

She is wrong though, I really want to do it. No one has been able to convince me otherwise. Not her, not my father. I think it's better this way, I have nothing to look forward to anyway. Yet, for some reason, I would want someone to give me a valid reason to not do it.

I go back around the bus stop and sit on the bench. Even with a short sleeve t-shirt and shorts it feels really hot out here. It doesn't really help that a hole in the small roof over my head lets the sun shine down directly on my face. Starting to feel a little bored I reach inside my pocket trying to get a hold of my phone. I find nothing and chuckle to myself.

"Idiot…"

I can't really remember the last time I was to the beach. I must've been really young. I know for a fact that I hate the sand. It's shitty enough that it burns your feet but on top of that it just gets everywhere.

I start regretting even more that I threw away my phone when I realize I can no longer call Haruhiko to tell him that I have arrived. He told me to call him from this stop so he would come out here to pick me up. I guess I will just have to wait for Ran and Sumiko to come by, after all, they did say their flight was scheduled just a bit after mine. Worst case scenario I can walk to the nearest house or store to borrow a phone.

I look to both of my side and see a long road stretch in both directions with nothing but trees at their sides. I look behind me and see the bay once again, there's a few houses scattered in between the palm trees and I believe I can see a small cabin-like structure close to the water. I can just hope it won't have to get to the worst case scenario.

Sighing out I rest my elbow over my legs and pull my bag closer to me. I unzip and spread it open a little. I only brought two changes of clothes, sandals, toothbrush, toothpaste, and my wallet. Come to think of it, the bag might be a little too big for just that. There's a ton of space for me to jam more things inside it.

Kikouka did mention the organization will be sure to cover any kind of living expenses, so it's not like I have to worry about clothes or things like that. I zip my bag up and push it under the bench.

I straighten my back a little bit and cross my arms as a pleasant breeze surges through. It feels great and it carries the scent of the sea along with it. I close my eyes and smile just a little.

My trance is a bit short lived as I hear the loud noise of a bus engine getting closer. Taking a look to my left reveals a truck much like the one I used to get here. I take a look at the bus schedule on my right and see that the rides are scheduled with an hour between them. I feel a little confused, but I just brush it off as the bus comes to a stop right in front of me.

The doors slowly open and a girl wearing a black sundress steps out. She carries a duffle bag much like my own under her arm as she holds her phone to her ear with her free hand.

Her blonde hair contrast nicely with her dress making it hard not to look at her. She looks at me and smiles widely; I smile as well and stand up to greet her with open arms.

"Hey Sumi-"

"Sorry, sorry," she interrupts me and she walks to the left a little, "Give me a sec while I finish this call."

I feel a bit betrayed that she would rather finish her call than hug me, but it's not like I'm about to vocally complain about it.

"Hey, uh…we just got to Nanjo!" she speaks into her phone, "Yeah, yeah, the flight was alright."

I turn my head to the still open doors of the bus and see Ran with a big grin over her face. She wears a dress identical to Sumiko's, the only difference being that hers is white. On top of that she holds a rather big straw hat with her hands. She exits the bus and puts it on, casting a big shadow over herself. She drops her bag on the floor and places both of her hands on her hips.

"Yuuji!" she yells, "How are you, besides handsome?"

I laugh as she gets close to me, once close enough she hugs me and squeezes me a bit tightly.

"I missed you," she says softly.

"We saw each other like four days ago," I chuckle.

"Ah geez, can you let me love you for a second here?!" she whines.

Suddenly she reaches for my arms and starts squeezing with her hand all the way up to my shoulders.

"Uhuhu," she laughs to herself, "Why didn't you show me these back in Tokyo? I didn't know you had been working out."

Not having much to do was of big help to start getting a bit of a healthier lifestyle. Not to mention that being in a coma for two years helped me slim down a bit. Besides, it's not like I have been doing much, I think the fact that I haven't gotten chubby again is thanks to me walking around the city to avoid getting back home.

"Well the city wasn't really appropriate for this kind of clothes," I say.

"You look good," she says with a grin.

Her comments make me focus a bit on her, mainly how her dress makes her look spectacular. I know nothing about woman's clothing, but the way the way the dress is literally just a size away from sticking to her body makes for a perfect fit.

"You look great as well," I say.

She wraps her arms around herself all of the sudden and squirms.

"Stop being such a pervert, Yuuji!" she says jokingly as she pushes me a little.

"Ok…yeah, I'll keep in touch, don't worry too much please," Sumiko says as she turns to us.

She gets closer little by little as she diligently listens to whomever she is speaking to on the phone. She nods and smiles as she listens to something both Ran and I can't hear.

"Yeah, to take care too," she says with a big smile, "Love you, mom."

She hangs up and with a bit of a blush puts her phone away in her bag.

"It melts my heart that you call her that," Ran says as she puts both of her hands on her chest.

"Even if she is not, I love her like one, so shut up," Sumiko replies, looking a bit flustered.

"It's good to see you again," I mutter softly in her direction.

She nods with a smile and hugs me as well. An idea still lingers in the back of my head as I stop hugging her. I bring my hand up to my face and scratch my nose.

"How did you guys get here so quickly?" I ask.

"Oh that's a funny story," Ran says as she sits down on the stop's bench.

I sit down next to her and clear my throat.

"How so?"

Sumiko sits next to me and lifts her arm up to cover her face from the sun that slips in through the hole on the roof.

"There was this huge line of buses at the airport and one of the drivers told us that he would bring us up here," she explains, "Something about it being a slow day or something."

"Huh, I see, that' isn't exactly funny though," I tease.

"Oh crap," Sumiko exclaims, "I need to call Haruhiko."

She digs her phone out of her bag and after going through her contacts she puts the phone up to her ear. I wipe a bit of sweat off my brow and sigh.

"Hey!" Sumiko sings, "Yeah, we are already here, yeah, uh…ok, yeah Yuuji is here. Oh….ok, ok, see you in a bit."

"What did he say?" Ran asks.

"He says that Mirai should be arriving soon as well, he's leaving the house to get us though."

I feel right where I should be for some reason. Just hearing the casual back and forth between these two and me sometimes joining in on the conversation just feels right. It feels like back in SAO. Even if that thought alone makes me want to punch myself I really enjoy it. However, that's also the reason why I want to leave. I don't want to be reminded of SAO anymore and being away from everyone will only make that easier. I love these two girls, they are two of my closest friends, but they also remind me of all my mistakes and that just messes with me.

"Hey, Yuuji," Ran says, "We wanted to give you something."

"Huh? Right now?" Sumiko asks.

"I figure it's as good time as any."

Curious I start looking back and forth between Sumiko and Ran. Sumiko opens her bag and takes out a small box. It has the name and logo of a brand I don't recognize. She hands it to me and a bit confused I grab the box.

"For me?" I ask.

"Of course, you dummy," Ran clarifies.

I open the box to reveal a very expensive looking watch. Its leather strap is wrapped around a small cushion which serves to present it to me. The dial looks very impressive, with a silver-like finish that definitely stands out form the bronze case. I take the watch into my hands and can't help but to stare at feeling a bit baffled.

"You shouldn't have…" I mutter, feeling very moved but lacking the words to express it.

"But we did," Sumiko answers.

"We just really thought you deserved something," Ran says, "You know, after all you did."

Those words weigh me down more than actually lifting me up. All I did was put people in danger, all I did was get people I loved hurt, all I did was fuck up constantly. I do not deserve this. These two girls are too kind to me; they think I did something great, something wroth notice.

I look down at the watch once more and sigh. Something worth not only their time but now also their money.

"All did was one mistake after another…" I mutter.

"I really hope you don't consider keeping us alive a mistake," Sumiko huffs.

"Geez Yuuji, your words heart my soft little heart," Ran complains.

"It's thanks to you that we are here today," Sumiko says, "You were our leader, and you stuck with us through thick and thin."

"You were willing to do anything to keep us all safe…" Ran adds, "It's the least we can do."

I remove the watch from the cushion and strap the thing around my wrist. If that's what they believe it would be rude to deny it.

I smile a bit, it's the least I can do for them.

We spend over twenty minutes just talking, making small talk to distract ourselves as we wait for Mirai to arrive. More than a couple of times I look down at my wrist to admire my new gift. I have never been one to wear watches or just accessories in general, but I really like this watch. It feels like it means something. Whether if it means something good or bad for I'm yet to find out, but I still appreciate it. However, I don't think I will keep it after today.

Another bus comes around the corner and starts slowing down as it approaches the bus stop. The air brakes sound off as it comes to a stop and the doors slowly open. A black lab hops out of the bus with its tongue out and slowly looks around only to sit down. Behind it, Mirai steps down from the bus holding the leash connected to a small vest the dog is wearing. She covers her eyes with her left hand as the sun hits her with its entire splendor and once she sees us she smiles.

"Hey guys," she says softly.

Ran, Sumiko and I just stare for a few seconds.

"You got a doggy?" Ran asks.

Mirai laughs as she looks down at the dog and raises the leash a little.

"Nah, I stole it," she jokes, "It's…uhm…"

She seems a bit embarrassed, but she gets closer to us and her dog follows with a wagging tail and a dumb happy look on its face.

"He's my…" she still struggles, "He's my therapy dog."

"Does he have a name?" Ran says as she pets the top of the dog's head.

Mirai clears her throat and appears to be a bit embarrassed once more. I take a look at the dog once Ran stops petting him and can't help but to feel he is looking right through me. I don't know much about therapy dogs, but what I have heard is that they have amazing instincts and they know how to be around people that need help.

For some weird reason as I see him close his mouth to examine all of us I can't help but to feel he knows we are all a bit broken.

"His name is Edelweiss," Mirai admits.

"You got to name him that?" Sumiko asks, "Awesome."

"He had another name…" Mirai says, "but I insisted on calling him that. They told me it didn't matter if I wanted to call him something else…so Edelweiss."

The bus leaves and seconds later a small white van stops behind Mirai. The window rolls down and Haruhiko greets us with a big smile from the driver's seat. One of the doors on the side slides open and Nao jumps out with her hand in the air.

"Mr. Guild Leader!" she yells, and her eyes quickly set themselves on Mirai's dog, "Doggy!"

Haruhiko leaves the car running and steps down to come and greet us all, he gives me a strong handshake followed by an equally as strong hug and helps puts all of our bags in the back of the van.

"I'm sorry, it's a bit of a drive up here," he says.

"Don't worry man," I say, "You weren't kidding about it being hotter than the city."

He closes the back of the van with a chuckle and I still can hear Nao losing her mind about there being a dog with us.

"Haruhiko!" Ran screams, "Where are the others?"

"Oh, Mio and Akari are already in the house, they are fixing up lunch," he replies.

"She is already here?" I ask a bit absentmindedly.

My question alone makes me get pity looks from everyone, even the freaking dog. They all try to play it out as if they just were staring past me, but I know all of them turned to me the second I asked my question.

"Yeah, she got here like two hours ago," Haruhiko explain, "Everyone in the van! I'm hungry and the ride isn't exactly short!"

He is like a completely changed man. For starters I can't remember him smiling this much back in SAO. He still towers above and has that strong air of authority, but he is just so happy now.

I get inside the van and sit on the back with Edelweiss and Mirai. Ran and Nao sit in the middle while Sumiko rides shotgun to accompany Haruhiko.

Edelweiss leans on me and whimpers a little as he forces his head under my arm. Mirai tries to pull him away but the dog is determined to stay close to me.

"Edelweiss…" Mirai says, her voice barely above a whisper, "I'm sorry he doesn't usually do that."

This dog knows, he fucking knows.

* * *

It didn't take as long as Haruhiko made it out to be to get to his house. The place itself looks to be old as hell, but I'm not about to complain. In a way it reminds me Sylvianna's inn. All of the floor except for the kitchen and bathroom are made out of tatami and there's sliding doors connecting every room. From the living room all you have to do is go down a couple of steps and you can find yourself in the beach. The place might be old, but housing this close to the water has to cost a fortune.

"This place is beautiful," Mirai says as she sits down on the floor of the living room.

Edelweiss sits just next to her and slowly shuffles his body to lean on her a little. Mirai puts her hand over the mutt's head and starts petting him. A small table with a jug of water and some cups is set in the middle of the living room area.

Ran sits down close to the table as well and pours herself a cup of water. She removes her hat and puts it down next to her as she drinks a whole cup of water in the matter of seconds.

"It's really something," I say and sit on the opposite side of the table.

The sound of the crashing waves it's soothing within its own right and the sight really is something to behold. It almost makes me wish I could stay longer, but I already agreed on the pick-up with Kikouka.

"Hi…" I hear a shy voice to my right.

"Hey," Mirai replies, "How are you?"

I turn my head a little and quickly enough see a wheel chair, on it sits Akari, she wears a timid smile as she approaches us with utmost care. I get up almost immediately, pretending I didn't even see her and make my way to the kitchen.

"I'm going to help Mio," I excuse myself.

Walking past Akari feels like the worst thing I have ever done in my life. I want to turn around and at the very least say hello, but what's the point in doing that? Inside the kitchen I see Mio cutting up some vegetables. As soon as I enter I see her turn around to face me, just like back in SAO she is quick to notice when someone enters her domain.

"You did come," she says with a smile.

"Haruhiko was a bit persistent about it," I huff.

"If that's the reason why you are here then I'm glad," she says as she pushes the freshly cut vegetables into a pot, "Did you come in here just because Akari went out?"

"I'm that transparent, huh?"

"You've always been, Master," she says, "Could you please pass me the salt? It's over in that cabinet."

I chuckle, even after all this time, she can't seem to drop that name. It would seem only in extremely rare occasions she chooses to call me otherwise. I follow her finger which is steadily pointing at a cabinet not far from her. I open the cabinet and take out a small bag with salt.

"Yeah, that will do," she says as she takes the bag away from me, "I should tell Haruhiko he is almost out though."

I watch her cook for a while. She silently walks around the kitchen, tasting the soup she is preparing and making sure the rice she is making comes out perfect. It's really easy to tell she has an otherworldly expertise while inside the kitchen. Having both of your parents being professional chefs helps a lot I think.

"You are not staying long…are you?" she asks.

She takes me by surprise as I have only been staring at her hands and everything she has been doing with them. I scratch the bridge of my nose and look away once she decides to stop to take a look at me.

"I don't think so, no" I admit.

"Is it safe to assume it's because of-"

"Her?" I cut her off, "yeah, she is a huge part of why I don't want to stay."

Looking completely dejected by my stern answer she diligently goes back to focusing on the food.

"You should give her a chance," she mutters under her breath, "It's not her fault she doesn't have her memory back."

Like a kid throwing a tantrum I storm off away from the kitchen and go past the living room without even batting an eye. I make my way to the room just next to it and sit on the floor, leaning against one of the sliding doors.

Mio is right though, it isn't her fault. If it's anybody's fault it's mine. It was me making stupid decision which ultimately led to Klaus killing her inside of SAO which led to her NeverGear activating. The sound of running water snaps my out of my thought and seconds later Nao comes into the room shaking her hands in the air. I notice she is coming out of the bathroom.

"Mr. Guild Leader!" she exclaims.

The small girl hops over to me and lands on her knees less than a few feet from me. Trying not to appear too pathetic I straighten up and smile as she approaches me.

"Don't call me that," I chuckle.

"Alshep!" she says.

"Not that either…" I smile weakly.

"Ok…Yuuji," she complains, as if I just had scolded her, "What are you doing here, by yourself? Everyone else is in the living room."

Nao, even back in SAO was never one to fully be able to read the air about certain situations.

"I'm…" I start, "I'm coming in just a second, I just needed a breather."

She stares at me for a few seconds and gets closer to me until she right next to me.

"Can I tell you a secret?" she asks.

"Of course," I answer.

She leans in close to my ear, until I can easily hear her breathe.

"Akari," she says, "she remembers some stuff."

"What?"

"Mirai has been trying to get her to remember," she says, "but you can't tell her I told you!"

To say that I'm not surprised would be a huge lie. I did know that Mirai and Akari had been keeping in touch, but I never thought it was with that particular goal in mind.

I think all the time I've known Nao all I have done has been underestimate her. She knows what's going on, even if it appears she doesn't. Unlike what I thought, she does know how to read a room and knows more than she lets on. It doesn't take long for her to convince me to join everyone else in the living room.

We all share a fantastic meal prepared by Mio, it tastes fantastic. It's nothing out of the ordinary, rice, soup with vegetables, and fish, but she manages to make them all taste amazing. I make sure to sit myself away from Akari, I'm still to work up the courage to even look at her. However, I notice her glancing my way, almost as if she wanted to talk to me. Despite this, she doesn't try to approach me either, it's like we are both afraid of each other or something.

I just need to make sure of one thing if I plan to leave later tonight, just one thing.

After a while of being lazy after eating we decide to move to the beach. Haruhiko and I set up a couple parasols somewhat close to the water and bring out a cooler with bottled water, and a few soft drinks.

All the girls and even the dog opt to go into the water, Mio being kind enough to bring a donut pool float to help Akari in the water.

I sit down over a towel under one of the parasol as I stare out to the girls playing in the water. They all seem to having a grand time. I raise my arm to take a look at my watch, it doesn't even feel like it's been that long but it's almost six in the afternoon.

I hear a few steps getting closer behind and don't even bother in looking back as I'm quite sure it's just Haruhiko coming back from the house.

"You should at least try talking to her," I hear him say as he sits next to me.

"What difference would it make?" I reply, "I can't force her to remember the things I want her to and even if I could…it…it wouldn't be fair."

He remains silent and then he dangles two bottles of beer in front of me. I turn my head to him and see him holding another two with his other hand.

"Care to join me?" he asks.

"Dude, I'm not old enough to drink yet," I say.

"You are not old enough to act like a grumpy old man either," he says, "come on, I won't tell the cops."

"Fine," I sigh, trying my best to not even chuckle at his lame humor.

He twists the caps off two of the beers and hands me one of the bottles. The bottle is completely chilled and it feels nice to hold in the hot weather. He brings his bottle close to mine and softly makes them hit one another making them clink.

"To this," he says, "and many more trips we'll do together."

I laugh with him and drink from my beer. It's a bit bitter, reminds me of how the ale tasted back in SAO, but it washes down my throat with incredible ease. It's not the best thing I have ever tried, but it's definitely not bad either.

By the time I take my third sip Haruhiko is already done with his first beer. He stands up quickly and stretches his arms up to the sun.

"Now, I'm not going to just sit around and watch you do nothing, so…hang on here a sec," he says and runs off to the girls.

I watch him closely as he approaches the girls. He gets knee deep in water before getting to Akari. I can already see myself regretting whatever he is going to try and do. They seem to talk to each other for a minute or so before he out of nowhere picks her up and starts heading back my way.

"God dammit…" I whisper to myself.

Quickly enough he gets back to me and sets Akari on the towel just next to me. She laughs in complete and utter embarrassment and I turn my head away as I take another sip from my beer.

"Haruhiko!" Nao screams from afar, "Come and play with us!"

"You two have fun," he says with a grin before running away from us.

I refrain from looking next to me. I don't even know what to say, I don't even know what to do. Where does one even start with things like this?

"Alshep…" she says softly.

With that alone I feel forces to look in her direction. She is looking at me with an intense gaze, straight into my eyes, despite of her uneasiness and embarrassment her eyes do not stray away from mine.

"I…I remember that," she says, "Just a bit…at the beginning of the game."

"Is that all you remember?" I ask softly.

"I remember a bit of Aeri and Daath as well…" she says, sounding pained, "He is not here with us…"

"He didn't make it," I mutter.

"I thought so…" she mumbles, "Mirai never wanted to tell me about him."

She nods to herself and looks down at her hands. I track her sight with my own and notice the countless scars covering her wrists and arms. Unconsciously I reach out and grab her right arm and wrist. I pull her a bit closer to me and she just lets me do so without even fighting back. I softly trace my finger over her scars, completely disregarding her personal space or feelings towards them.

"You told me about these once," I say.

"I did?"

"Yeah, you told me how you felt about the real world…" I stop myself, trying to choose my words, hoping not mess it up, "how free you felt inside SAO. I thought you would remember, after all you told me about it before meeting Aeri."

She blushes a little and clears her throat.

"I'm sorry," she says, "What little I have been able to remember has just been coming back in little pieces."

"It's not your fault," I huff as I let go of her arm.

Once again, lacking words, I turn away from her and take another drink from my beer.

"We…we must have been very close," she says.

We were.

"Were we close friends?" she asks.

I feel like crying, but I manage to keep everything in as that is probably the last thing I needed to hear. I try my best to smile and turn to her.

"Yeah, we were close friends," I say as I feel the last thing that tied me here completely disappear.

"I'm glad to hear that," she says.

She doesn't remember, she doesn't remember in the slightest. That will make it easier for me to leave. That's what I needed to hear, but I guess a part of me didn't want to hear it. Kikouka's words ring truer than they ever did. I have nothing going on, absolutely nothing.

It doesn't take much longer for the sun to go into hiding. I finish my beer and soon enough we all gather our things to get back inside the house. Some clouds starts rolling in as I help Mio with dinner and by the time we finish preparing the food it has already started to rain.

Nao makes it very clear that she is disappointed that it started to rain, given how she wanted to light some fireworks close to the sea. I make sure to have my bag close to the door of the house for when I have to leave. If I remember correctly Lynn should be arriving close to midnight, if not a bit a later, that way it'll be easier to just slip by everyone as they sleep.

Today was a great day all things considered. I had great food to eat; I had my first couple of beers. I laughed and talked the day away with a couple of my friends. I would be lying if I said I didn't enjoy it, but in the end, I already made a decision. And further down the line I truly think it's truly the best thing I can for myself at the moment. It might be selfish or inconsiderate to leave everyone like this, but it's something I have to do.

I've been sitting inside the bathroom for the better part of an hour already. The room outside is already set up with multiple futons in which everyone should be sleeping right about now. I take a look at my watch and release the strap from around my wrist. It's twelve twenty four.

I exit the bathroom, closing the door behind me and turning off the light. Meeting me right outside the door is Edelweiss; he looks ominous as his eye glimmer just slightly in the darkness.

"Hey buddy…" I mutter softly and pet his head.

He then shakes his tail around a little and carefully makes his way to Mirai. He lies down next to her and lowers his head. Even in the darkness I see Mirai's lip trembling and her body starting to shake slightly. She must be having a nightmare. Quickly Edelweiss moves his head and rests it over Mirai's stomach, gently prodding her with his nose, which ultimately makes her calm down.

"You take care of her, alright?" I say softly.

I almost expect the dog to nod back at me but he just closes his eyes as Mirai's hand finds its way over his head. Even after that, she is sleeping like a log.

Next to her I can see Ran and Sumiko cuddling, my favorite pervert is snoring loudly, but it doesn't seem to faze Sumiko in the slightest.

Akari sleeps next to Nao who is latched to Haruhiko's back like some kind of small monkey but all three of them look to be at peace. I set my watch on the empty futon between Haruhiko and Mio and start to head for the door.

"No…" Mio says in her sleep.

I tense up and turn around slowly to look at her. She just rolls on her stomach and yawns loudly.

"Lea-leave them over the counter, I'll cook'em later…." she says.

Even in her dreams she is doing stuff like that. I smile and continue my silent trek to the door. I put on my shoes and exit the house with my bag in hand. I hear the sound of the waves crashing overpower that of the lukewarm rain slightly. I step away from the door and the rain starts to drench my own body.

I take a couple of steps forwards and go past Haruhiko's van to take a look around the road. I see a slick black car just around the corner. At the moment I turn my head to the car its lights come on and I hear the engine starting.

This is it.

The car rolls down the road until it comes to a complete stop right in front of me. The window facing me rolls down and a blonde woman with black shades greets me.

"Why are you even wearing those?" I tease, "You missed the sun."

She gives me a weak smile as she removes her shades.

"Are you ready?" she asks.

I take a deep breath.

"Sure, let's do th-"

"You forgot your watch!" I hear behind me.

I turn around slowly and see Akari getting closer to me while on her wheelchair. She has my watch sitting over her lap as she struggles to roll her chair closer to me. A bit out of breath she finally reaches me and grabs my hand. She gives me the watch and keeps trying to get air into her lungs.

"It's…it's hard to get up on this thing in the dark," she laughs.

"Akari…" I mutter.

"I just want to say something before you leave," she huffs, "I have been trying to say it all day, but I just couldn't find the words, so please…hear me out, ok?"

She takes a couple more second to gather herself and all I can hear around us now is the sound of Lynn's car along with the rain that for some reason just seems to be getting louder and louder.

"I don't remember everything!" she yells, "and I'm so sorry about that! I wish I could, I really do. Mirai has been trying to help me out for so long now, but I can't seem to remember anything!"

Even with the countless drops of water crashing against her face I can tell each and every tear that escapes her eyes apart from the raindrops.

"But that doesn't mean you have to lie to me…" she says, "I might be assuming things at this point, but every time you've turned away to ignore today I feel my chest getting tighter and I don't like that feeling!"

"I'm sorry," I say.

"It's not your fault!" she screams, "I know it isn't! It's my own; it's my own feelings after all…but just tell me one thing, just one thing before you go…I beg you."

I guess at the very least I owe her that.

"Alright," I answer softly.

"I just need to know…" she mutters, "Just what kind of person was I to you?"

"You were the person I loved the most in the world."

Her eyes widen up and she holds both of her hands close to her chest. Tears run down her cheeks more frantically than before.

"Good bye, Akari," I say and turn around.

I open the door to Lynn's car and throw my bag inside.

"And you don't love me anymore?"

The feeling she just poorly described of my chest feeling tighter overcomes me as I hear her words. I close the door to the car and with heavy steps I set myself in front of her.

"Of course I do," I answer, "That's why I'm doing this…that's why I have to leave. I want this feeling to be gone already! I just can't bear it any longer!"

She shakes her head and gets just a bit closer. She grabs my right hand which I have tightly bound into a fist.

"I want this feeling here to be gone too, I want to remember all about you, all about our time together," she cries as she holds her hands together with my own over her chest, "So please…"

The rain just gets louder and louder.

"Please stay."

I lean over her a little and kiss her. She wraps her arms around me and kisses me back. I pick her up and hold her close, I nestle my head over her shoulder, fearing that something might take her away.

"All this time," I cry over her shoulder, "I didn't know what to do, it felt like I was doing the right thing, but all I'm good for is making mistakes."

"Don't worry," she says as she pats my back, "I know it must have been hard."

"I'll tell Kikouka you gave him the wrong address," Lynn says sounding exceedingly happy, "Take care, Yuuji."

Lynn leaves shortly after rolling her window up and I turn my body a little to watch the black car slowly go down the road until I can no longer see it.

"I knew you were lying to me," Akari giggles, "When you said we were friends."

"How come?" I ask.

"I just felt like we were so much more…" she says softly.

I set her back on her chair and look into her eyes for a few seconds.

"You always had this…instinct," I comment with a smile.

In a way, I think I knew all of what I was trying to pull was but a cry for help. I was hoping for someone to say the right thing, to do something that would make me stay, and it the end it was her…it had to be her.

"I think she left with your bag," she says and laughs a little.

I shake my head with a smile and place myself behind her chair. It doesn't matter that she took my clothes with her, worst case scenario I'll just borrow some from Haruhiko.

"What are you going to wear?" she asks.

Actually if we do come to a worst case scenario I wouldn't even mind borrowing Ran's dress. I grab the handles of her chair and start pushing her back inside to keep her away from the rain. She places her hand over mine to try and face me, but it just looks like she is going to hurt herself. Finally I get her inside and close the door behind me.

I take off my drenched shoes and put them far away from the other shoes by the door. She turns her chair around and with a pout in her face she pokes my stomach.

"You can talk," she says, "You know that, right?"

I nod.

"Let's start over tomorrow, is that ok?" I ask.

"Sure, let's do that," she answers with a smile, "Let's start over."

**-Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds-**

* * *

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed this adventure as much as I did!

I'm crying as I write this little AN, so I will keep it short as I plan to make one last upload which will be an long Author's note with my final thoughts on this story, special thanks, replies to your reviews in this last chapter, and what it was like to wrote it for the last two years. So keep yours eyes open in the coming days as I will upload that soon enough. It's raining dudes, it's raining so hard I can't even see, stupid rain.

**IC0: **The day has finally come friend, I'm eager to hear your final thoughts on this. You have great taste in anime man, I can't say that enough. It's been an honor to read your reviews holding my story in such high praise and I hope this has been a satisfying conclusion to this journey. **Never Reviewed: **When I first got your review I started crying, not as much as I'm now, but it really got to me for some reason. Thank YOU for reading my story! **owaychan: **Happy belated birthday I hope you enjoyed the ending! **OneTiredSloth: **I'm glad to see that you see a lot of yourself in Yuuji, as I once said in an AN a teacher told me that it's when the reader sees him/herself in your characters that you know you have done a good job. I never told you this my Sloth Friend (Cause I didn't get around to counting the reviews until yesterday) but you actually hold the totally arbitrary and random award to the 300th review in my story so congrats! **Electronic Ink 0: **It makes me so happy that you would actually name a D&amp;D character after someone in my story. MY WORK HAS TRANSCENDED INTO SOMETHING ELSE YAY! Thank you so much for your constant support! **SkySlash9: **And here we are, at the end. Thank you for tagging along since chapter 50, it doesn't matter when you jumped in, what matter is that you had fun! **jtgamer-aza: **Thank you so much for your words. If I may a little, I do take pride in having Kirito and Asuna not be a center piece of this story, in the end I think it's what helped it develop into it's own thing and not just yet another retelling of the SAO arc.

I say small AN and end up writing this whole thing, huh? Thank you so much to everyone that read this story, even if you reviewed or not I hope my story managed to entertained through this almost two and a half years. I love each and every single one of you for reading this story, for deeming it worthy of your time and feelings! I cannot thank you enough, this I have said several times, but trust me I do because I mean it.

AS ALWAYS! If you liked what you read and have made it this far, TO THE END! Please leave a review!

This has been yours truly, the author of Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds, Crysina, Good bye!


	85. Afterword

**Afterword**

Crysina here!

I hope you enjoyed reading my whole story!

Let's get this last Author's Note if you will on the road, I have quite a bit to talk about and I will be addressing the last reviews to my story!

I started writing this story with a bit of a not only pretentious, but really smug attitude. Like many if not all of you I saw/read SAO, and also perhaps like many of you I said to myself, I can do better. With that said, I will quickly express myself about Kawahara's work (SPOILERS FOR ALL OF THE STORY WRITTEN BY KAWAHARA UP UNTIL NOW):

Aincrad arc: Pretty good, interesting concept (Ultimately the idea of the game of death is what inspired my story, mainly the brief part in the SAO arc with the focus on the Moonlit Black Cats. Even if Kawahara does throw all seriousness out the window once he basically tells us that Kirito is god and nothing bad will ever happen to him), while Kirito's personality purely depends on which girl is closest to him I can overlook that and the fact that he is always right about everything. He's a Gary Stu after all.

Fairy arc: What?

GGO arc: Another interesting premise (The idea that mentally unstable survivors of LC from the SAO incident would do something like this isn't farfetched and actually makes for an interesting mystery, even if it does end up being something laughably stupid), interesting new virtual world and most important of all, a female character that sets herself apart thanks to her character development not depending on our god and savior Kirito, she was interesting, and developed. ONLY TO LATER BE DOWNGRADED TO BE ANOTHER OF THE OTHER BITCHES IN KIRITO'S HAREM, SERIOUSLY SCREW YOU MAN SINON WAS AN AMAZING CHARACTER UNTIL YOU MADE HER ANOTHER OF KIRITO'S LAP DOGS!

Mother's Rosario: In my honest opinion the arc where Kawahara redeems himself for treating Asuna as horribly as he did. Also Yuuki is bae dawg.

Calibur arc: What? 2: The Whatenning

Alicization Arc: Holy shit, freaking amazing. Another interesting virtual world, the stakes are higher than they have ever been before. New characters! New Places! A little bit on the nose but cool underlying commentary about how humans are shit and an IA would run a better society than us. UNTIL KAWAHARA FREAKING SHOEHORNED ALL THE GIRLS FROM THE PREVIOUS ARCS INTO THE UNDERWORLD. WHY YOU DO THIS KAWAHARA, WHY?!

With that out of the way let me arrive to what I was saying, so after having this smug idea that I could do better we arrive to the following facts:

1.- I did not create the universe in which SAO and my story take place, Reki Kawahara did.

2.- I did not create some of the characters that serve as pivotal points in my story such as Asuna, Lisbeth, Kirito and even Agil, Reki Kawahara did.

3.- I am not a published author with an animation adapting my writing which has also spawned several games, manga, other spin-off novels, an upcoming animated movie and a newly announced American tv adaptation of my work (holy crap did you hear about that?!), Reki Kawahara is.

4.- I am not drowning in cash, Reki Kawahara probably is.

This thought lasted me probably just around 6 chapters which is where I can say that my story departs from borrowing much, if not everything about the original SAO arc written by Kawahara. This way I was able to move away from trying to create a better story than he did and instead make my own thing. My goal was to stray away as far as I could from the original SAO pointers to create a story that could be contained in the same universe and story line that Kawahara created, therefore giving it the respect it deserved as the story that inspired me to write my own.

As I believe I said probably once or twice, English is not my mother tongue. However, I have a lot of love for it. This is mainly because I had an amazing English teacher that just made me love the language itself. I do not master this language though and as you can see on the last review lovely IC0 left I still need to improve. This fic is plagued with dumb little mistakes I wish could've been avoided and as of right now I'm still going back to my earlier chapters and trying to fix them up. A part of me wanted to write this story in Spanish as well but after testing out how some chapters would sound in Spanish I just stopped cause I hated it, kinda silly.

I fear that I might be tooting my own horn a lot in this author's note, but either way, bear with me a bit longer. As you can see in my very first chapter, I started working on this fic a long time ago, over four years now I believe. The first time I uploaded this story I stopped uploading on chapter 14. I stopped there because I didn't know where I wanted to take my story, I considered a ton of things and multiple ways in which my story could play out. I'll list a few since I consider it a bit funny now and I figure you guys can also get a bit of a kick out of this. Basically the story would have stayed the same until chapter 29, but after that we could've gone in different directions.

After chapter 29 Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds would've been a whole different story, and the changes would've been purely tied to who died on chapter 30.

Elina is killed by Klaus.-

In this particular turn of events Al would've followed a path much like Aeri's in the story but with a much darker tone. Kayla and Regi would've left the guild along with Alshep and dedicate their entire time to killing red players. This would have left Owl, Esra, Daath, Aeri, Ruri and Twyla to manage the guild that Al started. Daath being the amazing guy that he is would've done his best to keep following Al's vision of helping other players and giving them a chance. However, unlike Al in the original storyline, Daath would've searched for Al at any moment that allowed it, trying to get his friend out of this killing rampage that was triggered by the death of his loved one.

Al is killed by Klaus.-

Here no one would have left the guild. After the death of their guild leader the Leadership of the Guild would fall to Daath who then would struggle to keep everyone together as he would be the one to follow the dark path of killing red players. Giving birth to madness inside him and taking on once more the name of Datell. In this storyline Aeri would try to comfort him, going above and beyond to stop Daath from seeking revenge. Ultimately this storyline would have sadly featured Elina committing suicide. (As if my story wasn't depressing enough already)

Aeri is killed by Klaus.-

This would've been truly the most brutal possible storyline for the story. With Aeri dead the desire for revenge would've brewed not only in Daath but in Alshep as well. This would eventually lead to Daath and Al becoming stronger and reckless as they build up the guild to only be constituted of Player Killer Killers. This would've been a little too angsty and edgy for my taste, but it was still an idea that I considered. The ending for this storyline would've been an all-out war between a massive White Snakes guild and the players brought together by Daath and Alshep.

Literally everyone but Ruri, Al and Kato are killed by Klaus.-

This was a possibility that really piqued my interest for some time and I actually wrote quite a bit of it before completely discarding it. This storyline had Ruri, Al and Kato on the run for several chapters. The idea for this particular storyline was to play around with the fact that Ruri, Al and Kato are completely different beings. I eventually planned for Ruri and Al to fall in love. And the three of them would eventually join he KoB, this way I would use Asuna in more than a handful of chapters as they rise to become raid leaders representing the KoB along with Asuna.

If I'm completely honest I wish I could've explored option 1 and 4, but I'm more than happy with what Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds ended up being. However I do wish I could've done some other things. I wish I could've giving more development to Kato, I wish I could've done something other than literally killing Siren off-screen. I wish I could give you at least a couple more chapters where you can see my characters being happy. I want to show you Akari remembering things about her past with Yuuji. I want to show you more of Ran and Sumiko together. I want to show you Mirai getting better. I want to show you Haruhiko and Nao having a happy life. I want to show you Mio cooking in her parent's restaurant. But, this would all be meaningless and merely to make myself feel better after treating these characters I created like I did. It would add nothing to my story as I see the ending I gave it to be fitting.

Again to be honest and further increase the length of these final words you will see posted to this story, I heavily considered making a sequel for Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds. I even thought of a name for it, "S0ul &amp; Reco11ection" cause I am so original haha.

The sequel would be about Yuuji going over to Project Alicization. For this, the ending you see to this story would change a little. Akari would fail to convince Yuuji to stay and thus Yuuji would leave with Lynn. I had quite a few ideas considered for this "sequel". Lynn under the orders of Kikuoka would get Yuuji to the airport and drug him and get him on a plane to later transport to a still in development "Ocean Turtle" which is the installation in which the Alicization arc takes place. At this point in time a working version of the Soul Translator that Kazuto uses would not be completed yet, but Yuuji would be the first to both use a prototype and later the final product.

This I would like to think would be a breath of fresh air. Yuuji would be in a completely new setting, despite accepting to go into the Underworld he would still be sort of held against his will in the Ocean Turtle. So while embracing his new life to the fullest he would still feel a little trapped. There would be a vast array of new characters interacting with him, both from the novels and OC's I would come up with it. For a time I was really excited about making this, to a point I still am, but I do not wish to bastardize the ending to my story like that. At least not now.

Writing this story has been one hell of a journey. Time and time again I would think I wouldn't be able to write the next chapter, I was scared that I might screw something up, that the next review I was going to get would be someone saying that they hated my story. However, that never happened, I got nothing but good vibes and praise from the people that left reviews. It became more about trying to make something you guys would enjoy and love than worrying about whether it was going to be good or not. This task eventually stopped being that a "task" it truly became something I would look forward to work on just to see what you guys would think about it. I can't thank you enough for this. So please, if you ever shared kind words to me be more than sure that you deserve some credit for making this story what it is right now.

Speaking of thank you's I have a couple people in particular that I feel the need to name since I am forever grateful to them.

-Casquis (for inspiring me to write my own fic and giving me feedback whenever I asked him to. This man is the author of an amazing story in the Halo section of this site called "The Life")

-Rafa (for staying up until late at night talking to me on skype, calling me an idiot and giving me constant feedback on my chapters)

-Turi (for drawing a few things for my fic, and giving me crushing, well thought out feedback on my story)

-Fecho (for hearing me ramble constantly as we played Dark Souls or Overwatch as to what things I thought would be cool for my story)

-Terra Booma (the user that came up with Owl as a character submission to my story)

-davidholguin2 (for the conception of Aereth)

-BeastZoroark145 (for coming up with Siren)

-CortanTheOtaku (for literally coming up with the scenery and quest for chapter 62 "Burnout")

-Donna Hufflepuff (For beta-reading 11 of my chapters)

-Mangachiaki (for beta-reading 22 of my chapters)

-Devilparrot (for beta-reading 2 of my chapters)

-DragonofAnnoth (for beta-reading 15 of my chapters)

And last but not least.

-You (for reading this far)

Ain't that cheesy? Trust me there is nothing I would love more than to write down the username of every single person that ever favorited or followed my story, but that unless make this much longer than it has to be, however, I hope that the replies I have done to each and every reviewer to my story are more than enough proof that I value each and every single user that has bothered themselves with being involved in my story. Thank you, each and every single one of you, thank you so much.

And now, for my last replies to your reviews with a bit of a different format, since it will be the last time I do it for this story.

**Guestt: **It's a bit funny the first thing I did after posting the last chapter was go over to a friend's house and play a bit Dynasty Warriors 6. I had a listen to the song you mentioned and I have to say, it truly captures the feelings you describe. Thank you so much for reading!

**Legoboy0109: **I'll be sure to check out Blue Sky and if you remember that Harry Potter fic be sure to tell me! It really makes me feel all fuzzy to know my writing did so much for you. I'm so glad, truly. As for the future, I hope to see you leaving a review, but this time for a different story! Thank you so much for reading!

**The Redundant Button: **It doesn't matter at what point you joined in, what matters is that you enjoyed it! I'm happy to hear you are glad with the ending. Thank you for leaving such and awesome review as your first for my story! I hope to see you in my next story! Thank you for reading!

**Solstius: **As I said, a part of me still wishes to do something with these characters I have created, but I'm unsure as to what I would do and IF I should. Nevertheless, I'm happy to know you enjoyed reading my story and thank you for such a kind review. Thank you for reading!

**Smuglehorn: **It was my weekly routine as well, and trust me I don't regret it in the slightest either. I'm so happy to know that my story and characters now exist in your heart, thank you so much for letting me know that. As I have answered in a PM I sent you in case you didn't get it. You are more than welcome to use any of my characters in your stories. That said, I would love it if you linked me to the stories if you ever choose to upload them. Thanks for asking like you did, I'm sure you'll respect my babies haha. Thank you for reading!

**Electronic Ink 0: **Yeah, haha, I just had to give my characters a lot of happy things. They did suffer for most of the story after all. Thanks you so much for your praise, but despite that let me let you know I will strive to improve further. Thank you for reading!

**SkySlash9: **I'm going to miss proofreading on Sundays just mere hours before posting. Thank you so much for your kind words, even if not everyone appreciates my work and more than glad to know that you do. Thank you for reading!

**IC0: **I truly enjoyed reading this in-depth review. Trust me nothing makes me more ashamed than re-reading some chapters and finding dumb mistakes. English is not my mother tongue, but I thought I would have a better handle of it by now, but no haha. I will however try harder to avoid stupid mistakes like the ones you point out. The fights in my story I'm really proud of haha, I guess because I just had pure fun writing them while listening to really intense songs. I will admit at some point I was about to pull something similar to Yui with Sylvianna but I was like, better not. (Small rant, I'm sorry everyone but I hate Yui, she is creepy and her whole existence after she meets Kirito and Asuna is bullshit. Even more so when she dares say Kirito and Asuna are the only players to ever experience love, fuck that.) I miss Owl, Regi and Twyla man, I felt so bad after killing them. Thanks for deeming my depictions of canon characters appropriate. As for the plot as you probably already read, I really wanted for my story to exist within canon, I made sure to not intrude into canon events without making sure it made sense in the already existing universe and I'm glad than more than a few people recognize that my story can exist without altering the already existing universe of SAO. Thank you so much for recommending me to your friends, maybe they will read this in the future haha. I hope to see you as well in the future. Thank you for reading!

**Lennartz-L02: **I do hope to keep writing and improving, thank you so much! Thanks for reading!

**Guest: **I believe this review was meant for the last chapter given its content so yeah. It's neat to know that you basically binge-read my story haha. Thank you so much for reading!

**OneTiredSloth: **You honor me, I very much hope you are running Al without a shield, Owl with the tankiest build and Billfray with the Great Corvian Scythe. I hope to see you in the future as well, and I love you too my Sloth friend! Thank you for reading!

That is it for the reviews posted for the last chapter of my story as of today. I love that I see that quite a few of you are looking forwards to whatever I write next. I am a little unsure as to what will be my next adventure.

I've been thinking about some solid ideas about both Re:Zero and Overwatch. However, I would be lying if I said I know exactly what I want to do and when I will start posting it. So for now I apologize for not knowing when I will make a return as an author to this site. THAT BEING SAID, I hope it's soon.

That's my final thoughts on this journey folks. Right after posting this I will be marking my story on the mange stories area from "on-going" to "Completed". Damn, it really has me feeling emotional again haha. That's it though, this will be the last thing I will be uploading to this story. I will still be trying to fix my previous chapters as I haven't been able to go through all of them.

One last time. Thank you so much for reading Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds! I hope you had fun! I hope you cried! I hope you laughed! I hope you enjoyed it! As of right now 4:20 PM 17 of August 2016 Stee1 &amp; Sw0rds has 28,806 views, 324 reviews, 100 followers and 89 favorites!

I will see you all in another story! Good bye!


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